


They Call Me Villain

by Shiro_Darkness



Category: Stray Kids, VIXX
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Chan and Felix are like brothers, M/M, Sanghyuk and Jisung are brothers, Supervillains, same with Hongbin and Minho
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-17
Updated: 2019-07-05
Packaged: 2020-01-15 17:12:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 29,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18503416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shiro_Darkness/pseuds/Shiro_Darkness
Summary: In this world, everyone has a superpower. Some are powerful, some not. Some are seen as heroic, some villainous. Some people are heroes, some are villains. And some people are something in between.Originally posted on AsianFanFics.





	1. Intro

In this world, superpowers could be found everywhere. Flight, super strength, invisibility. Everyone had something. Sometimes the power was big and flashy and powerful. Sometimes it was something small, something that didn’t appear useful or cool at first glance. Most fell somewhere in between. Most of the time, a person’s power depended on their parents. A person would inherit one their power from one of their parents. Sometimes it was the exact same power, sometimes it was slightly different. Slightly more powerful. 

Some people would inherit a power that was a hybrid between their parent’s powers. For example, someone with the ability to manipulate time might have a parent who could freeze time and another who could see the future. In some cases, a person could end up with a power nothing at all like either parent’s power. Science hadn’t figured out why this happened, but they suspected that the answer to this mystery lay deep within a person’s DNA.

With all of these powers in the world, it was only natural that super heroes and super villains existed as well. 

Han Sanghyuk loved heroes. He loved watching them fight villains and protect people. He dreamed of the day when he could be a hero like the people he saw on the news. He’d play heroes with his little brother Jisung, saving the younger from all kinds of imaginary evils. All of his parents’ friends would tell him that he was destined to be a hero. That he had the right power for the job. Their words always left Sanghyuk grinning proudly, happy that people thought he could save people.

All of that hero worship, all of those dreams, came to an end when he realized the truth.

Not all heroes were good. Many didn’t care about the people they were supposed to be protecting. And the news was just as bad. They didn’t care either, they had the ability to expose the fake heroes but they never did. They turned a blind eye to the truth and filled the minds of the people with the idea that everything was fine.

Sanghyuk decided that he would put an end to it.


	2. Sanghyuk and Jisung

Nine year-old Sanghyuk giggled at something his mother said as they walked down the street. Jisung had asked for chicken for dinner, but they didn’t have a couple of ingredients for the chicken-based dish that their mother wanted to make. So their mother went out to the store, Sanghyuk accompanying her because he thought that she needed someone to carry the bags. Their father stayed home, keeping an eye on Jisung.

Everything was fine until a villain showed up.

Sanghyuk was so excited, he was going to get to see a hero fight up-close. His mother wasn’t nearly as happy as she dragged him into cover. Sanghyuk pouted as his mother covered him with her body, trying to give him an extra layer of protection. He didn’t think he needed it, the hero would be there soon to save them after all. If they did need any more protection, then he could just use his fire, right?

The hero was soon on the scene and Sanghyuk grinned brightly when he realized that it was one of the top ten. The top ten were some of the greatest heroes in the world! Sanghyuk had never thought he’d get to see one in person, never mind seeing one fight. He whispered all of this excitedly to his mother who breathed a sigh of relief. With a top ten hero there, she knew her son would be alright.  
The fight started and soon the whole street was a disaster zone.

Sanghyuk didn’t know when exactly his hiding place exploded, all he remembered was his mother hugging him one moment and the next he was laying in the street. Everything he remembered after that……it was just pictures, short moments that haunted his dreams for years afterwards. Every time, he woke up in a cold sweat and just had to make sure that those he cared about were still alive. That they were still in one piece. Then he’d sit up the rest of the night, mind replaying the images over and over until morning came.

The sky above him had been blue, not a cloud in sight.

His mother lay beside him, her eyes still open as blood pooled around her. 

The ‘hero’ mid-punch as the villain tried to dodge.

Other heroes showing up, trying to help the victims of the whole thing.

The ‘hero’ standing over the defeated villain while reporters took pictures.

Being loaded onto a stretcher while the ‘hero’ focused on talking to the news.

Sanghyuk’s last thought before he passed out was that this man was no hero.

\--

“Dad?” Sanghyuk asked when he opened his eyes.

“Oh, god,” his father gasped, rushing to his son’s side, “Sanghyuk, you’re ok.”

“Dad?” Sanghyuk asked again, looking around, “where…..where are we?”

“We’re at the hospital, Hyukkie,” his father replied, trying his best not to cry and failing, “you…..you were hurt really badly. They……they said they…..” his father broke down crying and Sanghyuk tried to piece together everything.

“Mom,” he finally said, “where…..where is she?”

Honestly, Sanghyuk already knew the answer. But he just……he wanted his father to tell him that he was wrong. That his mother was alright. But his father didn’t tell him that, he just cried harder. Sanghyuk felt sick. He let out a small sob and then he was crying just as hard as his father.

“He did this,” Sanghyuk cried, “that……that fake hero killed her!”

“Sanghyuk,” his father instantly sobered at that, “please……please don’t say that.”

“Say what?” Sanghyuk asked, his father’s sudden change scaring him, “what……what’s going on, dad?”

“Your mother,” his father sighed and suddenly he looked so tired, “she wasn’t the only one who died. You….you’re only one of three victims who left that street alive. One died while the doctors tried to save them, so……really you’re only one of two survivors.”

“Only one of two?” Sanghyuk breathed, eyes wide with horror. 

The street had been full of people. People coming home from work. Mothers running out to get some missing ingredients for dinner. Children his age and younger laughing with their friends before heading home. Now all of them……they were dead.

“Sanghyuk,” his father lowered his voice, “you and I know that the hero is really to blame. So does the other survivor. But that guy……he was offered some kind of deal, something to keep his mouth shut about everything. He took it.”

“What?” Sanghyuk hissed, his anger spiking, “why would he do that?”

“Because he had no choice,” his father sighed, “and neither do we.”

Sanghyuk fell silent, staring at his father in horror.

“They made me an offer I couldn’t turn down,” his father explained, begged really, “they said…….they said that if I didn’t take it, if I didn’t keep you quiet about the truth……they……they would make sure you wouldn’t say anything at all. They threatened to kill you, Sanghyuk. You and Jisung. Please understand, I had no choice. I already lost your mother, I refuse to lose you and your brother as well.”

“I get it,” Sanghyuk said after a long moment of silence, “I get it, dad.”

Sanghyuk did get it. His father didn’t have any other option. He was forced to let his wife’s killer walk free because he couldn’t lose his boys as well. That didn’t make Sanghyuk any less angry, it just shifted his hate and anger away from his father. Did all heroes operate like this? Did they all threaten people into keeping silent about their failures? About their crimes?

Suddenly, Sanghyuk didn’t want to be a hero. If this was how the heroes did things, he’d much rather become a villain. But not just any kind of villain. He decided in that moment that he would be the villain to bring the fake heroes to their knees. He would take this rotten hero system and burn it to ash. And in its place he’d leave something better.

\--

“Nice work, kid,” the sleazy crime boss grinned at Sanghyuk, tossing him his payment, “very nice work indeed.”

“Thanks,” Sanghyuk replied, grabbing the money and turning to leave.

“Before you go,” the boss called, “I have another job I wanna talk to you about.”

“Go ahead then,” Sanghyuk said, turning back around to face his current employer.

“I’ve been having some issues down at the docks,” the boss explained, “Some new fuckers are trying to cut into my turf. Take care of it for me, would ya? I’ll pay you twice as much.”

“I’ll deal with them tomorrow,” Sanghyuk replied before actually leaving this time.

He really didn’t like working for criminals, but everyone had to start somewhere. And it wasn’t like he was going to be able to find allies working alongside the law-abiding citizens. No, the criminals were the only ones who would even try to see things his way. Given, their dislike of heroes came from a much different place then his, but beggars can’t be choosers. Plus if anyone turned on him, a lot less people would be concerned about the charred corpse of a villain then that of a good person.

“I’m home,” Sanghyuk sighed hours later when he entered his apartment. 

Like always, no one answered back and Sanghyuk took a moment to regret moving out of his family’s home. He missed his father’s cooking and Jisung’s laughter. But living on his own was necessary for his goals. What he was doing left him coming and going at odd hours, something he knew that his family would notice right away if they still lived together. If they knew what he was doing, they would try to stop him and Sanghyuk…..he couldn’t stop. Not until he’d achieved his dream.

So, Sanghyuk applied for a college far enough away from home that no one could justify him staying there. He moved out, secretly changed most of his classes to online courses so he could do the work when it fit his schedule, and everything was perfect. Except for those days where he missed his family. Those days were always hard. Sanghyuk sighed as he hung up his coat, making a silent promise with himself to call his brother later and arrange a visit for the weekend. 

“You’re home late,” Jisung’s voice startled Sanghyuk so much that he actually flamed up.

“Jisung?” Sanghyuk gasped, “what-what are you doing here?”

“I thought I’d check in with you,” Jisung replied, watching Sanghyuk carefully, “so I called you last night and got no answer. I thought that was weird because you have classes in the morning so you should be in, but then I thought ‘oh, he must just be studying and turned off his phone, I’ll just try again later.’ So I did, and I still didn’t get an answer.”

“So you came to check on me,” Sanghyuk sighed, mind trying to think up excuses. Anything to cover up the truth.

“And you weren’t even here,” Jisung nodded, “so I thought I’d stick around and see when exactly you came back from……..whatever it is you’re doing.” Jisung paused, giving Sanghyuk a hard look before saying anything else, “I looked around, Sanghyuk.” Don’t even try to lie to me.

“If you looked around,” Sanghyuk said after a moment, “then you already know what I was doing.”

The brothers fell silent, just watching each other and waiting for someone to do something.

“Why?” Jisung finally asked.

“You need to be more specific,” Sanghyuk said, taking a seat at his kitchen table and gesturing for his brother to sit across from him, “why am I doing this? Why am I working with criminals?”

“The second one,” Jisung said, “I……I already know the answer to the first.” Mom.

“Where else am I going to fine people who’ll listen to me?” the older Han asked the younger, “you know as well as I do how much society loves heroes. Everyone already thought I was odd for not being interested in them, what do you think they’d do if they learned I hated them? That I wanted to change the system?”

“But aren’t you just as bad as them?” Jisung challenged, “You’re helping criminals! People who’ll hurt the innocent!”

“Nothing I’ve done has led to innocent people getting hurt,” Sanghyuk huffed, “I’ve made sure of that. All I do is burn people.”

“Burn them?” Jisung asked, eyes wide, “you…..kill people?”

“Only bad people,” Sanghyuk shrugged, a small voice in the back of his head reminding him that he shouldn’t be saying something like that so casually. But Sanghyuk had been killing people since he turned seventeen, just before he moved out. He was twenty one now and killing……..he’d learned not to think twice about it.

After all, it wasn’t like he was killing good people.

“But you still kill them!” Jisung snapped, “good or bad…….aren’t they still people?”

“Is the guy who killed mom a person?” Sanghyuk countered, glaring darkly at the table, “what about all the other fakes who kill innocent people and never think twice about it? Who ruin lives and families without a second thought?”

The two fell silent after that. Eventually, Sanghyuk got up and went to bed and Jisung left for school. Jisung was silent the whole day, his classmates sending him worried looks. He thought about what Sanghyuk was doing, what he wanted to do. Was it really that bad? The system was corrupt and broken, he’d be a fool not to see that. But killing people, even bad people…….was it right?

Jisung……he didn’t really remember his mother. He’d only been four when she was killed, so most of his memories were fuzzy but her smile……that was something he remembered clear as day. Her voice when she said his name, when she called him her little squirrel, echoed in his dreams often. He also remembered the last time he saw her, leaving the house with Sanghyuk because they needed something for dinner. Jisung didn’t talk about it, but sometimes……sometimes he blamed himself for what happened.

She’s only been out because of him. He’d wanted chicken for dinner and she was going to make it for him because she was a great mother. When he realized that his mother wasn’t coming back…….he hadn’t touched chicken since. The very sight of the meat had made him sick for several years after her death. What made him feel worse was seeing the effect losing her had on his father and brother. After her death, his father always looked so sad. Even when he smiled, he still looked sad.

And Sanghyuk……..

Sanghyuk was angry with the world after that. His big brother used to laugh and smile, used to joke around and play with him. But when their mother died…….all of that stopped. Sanghyuk stopped laughing, stopped smiling, and he didn’t play with Jisung anymore. He’d overheard their father on the phone once, telling the other person that it felt like he’d lost his wife and son that day. Jisung agreed, it really did feel like they’d buried Sanghyuk when they buried mother.

And now…….now Sanghyuk was killing people. His kind, wonderful, and sweet big brother that he’d always looked up to was on a path that would see him kill a lot of people. He went over the conversation he’d had with Sanghyuk again, still desperately trying to find an answer somewhere in those words. 

Jisung’s answer didn’t come until a couple of days later when one of his classmates died. The news claimed that it was the villain’s fault, that the hero who’d shown up had done all they could to protect the group of hostages. But Jisung knew the truth, his classmate had died because the hero was a fake. The store had been leveled, everyone inside crushed under the weight of the roof. That villain wasn’t strong enough to do something like that, but the hero was. The hero had the perfect power to do something like that.

Jisung left school that day in a rush, running right to his brother’s apartment.

“Jisung?” Sanghyuk asked, looking over the younger Han worriedly, “are you alright? What happened?”

“I want to help you,” Jisung said, “with what you’re doing. The….the fake heroes need to be stopped. They……they killed mom and they killed Jimin and they’ve killed tons of other people and…..and they need to be stopped!” 

He was crying by the end of his speech. All he could think about was his mother and his classmate. The girl from his class, Jimin……..he’d known her for years. He could remember playing with her when he was little, going over to her house for her eighth birthday party. He’d helped her put up lost dog posters when her dog ran away and gone with Sanghyuk to return the animal when they found it at the beach a few days later. She was always smiling and she wanted to be a doctor. She had her whole life ahead of her and now…….

Now she was dead just like his mother.

“Hey,” Sanghyuk said, hugging his baby brother tightly, “hey, it’s ok. Jisung, it’s going to be ok. I’ll fix it, I promise. I’ll make it better.”

Jisung nodded through his tears, trusting that Sanghyuk would make good on his promise to make things better.


	3. The Twin Flames

Sanghyuk already had a pretty good name within the criminal underbelly, so Jisung didn’t have it too hard when he started joining his brother on jobs. Most people saw his own blue fire and smiled, trusting that he was competent enough to do the work. Plus, if Sanghyuk had decided to work with him, he had to be good, right? The only problem was that Jisung didn’t really want to kill.

“It’s alright,” Sanghyuk had smiled when Jisung confessed his problem, “I can handle that part on my own. You just do what you can to make sure that the target doesn’t get away, alright?”

Jisung had agreed, more than happy to take the easy out that Sanghyuk had provided. But that out didn’t last forever. Eventually, Sanghyuk’s plans left the brothers in a position where Jisung had to take the life of another. The fake hero that they were hunting came from a rich and powerful family, a family that had easily paid people to cover up the fake forcing himself on some poor girl. He’d told her that she owned it to him for saving her from a house fire. Sanghyuk couldn’t be sure, but from what he’d found on the guy he suspected that this girl wasn’t his first victim.

So, the brothers started following the fake hero around. They figured out his habits and his work schedule, then the planned out how they would take him down. It was a pretty simple plan, basically just a copy of what they’d done to the dozens of villains before. They’d trick him into a secluded area, Jisung would cut off the exits with his fire, and Sanghyuk would go for the kill. Simple. Unfortunately, things didn’t go exactly as planned.

The hero tried to fight back, but unlike all those before him he could fight pretty well. Sanghyuk wasn’t that great a fighting, he relied too heavily on quickly burning his enemies, so it wasn’t long before the hero was cornering him. That was when Jisung stepped in. He knew the hero was going to hurt his brother, was going to drag him to the police and have him locked away forever.  He couldn’t let that happen, so he burned the hero. He’d planned to just distract the hero, but then he turned to face Jisung and……and all he could see was the hero who’d killed his mother, the hero who killed his friend.

Afterwards, he cried into his brother’s arms, mourning the loss of human life. Sanghyuk didn’t say anything, didn’t try to tell him that he did the right thing or anything like that, he just let him cry. Killing slowly got easier after that and sometimes Jisung wondered if that was a good thing or not. The news said that it wasn’t, but…….but they were protecting people. That was the reality of the situation; every dead fake hero was another civilian life saved. Maybe Jisung was wrong, maybe he wasn’t doing good, but……but he honestly didn’t care. Not anymore.

 

\--

 

“Wow,” Jisung gasped as he stared at the screen of his lap top, “Hyuk, you gotta come see this?”

“What’s up?” Sanghyuk asked around the toothbrush in his mouth, taking a seat beside Jisung on the couch.

Their father had passed away shortly after Jisung had turned seventeen. Honestly, as sad as the brothers were over their father’s death, they were kind of relived. He could be with their mother now, he could be happy again. Her loss was hard on them all, but especially their father. He might have thought he’d lost Sanghyuk along with his wife, but the truth was that the boys had lost him along with their mother.

After the funeral, Jisung had moved in with Sanghyuk. He’d tried to drop out of school so that he could help Sanghyuk full time, but Sanghyuk had insisted on him at least finishing high school before doing that. Still, Jisung ended up skipping a lot of class in order to help Sanghyuk. He’d graduate, but just barely.

“We’ve got a fansite,” Jisung explained, turning the laptop so that he brother could see easier, “and it’s got a bunch of hits.”

“Really now?” Sanghyuk asked, more than a little interested, “what are the comments saying?”

“There’s a few people trashing the site,” Jisung reported, “they think we’re just some mindless killers. But most people don’t agree.”

“I see,” Sanghyuk nodded, smiling slightly.

“There was one comment I read,” Jisung said, “They were saying that heroes tend to have powerful, intimidating powers. That people don’t stand up to heroes, let them do as they wish, because they’re scared. Do you think that’s why the news never talks about the truth? Because most of them have weaker powers and they’re scared?”

“Maybe,” Sanghyuk hummed as he read, “I remember reading once about this reporter from another country that put out an article criticizing a bigger name hero about….ten or so years ago. That reporter was in a car crash not too long after. No one ever said that the hero was to blame, but…….the timing was pretty convenient, right?”

“Hmm,” Jisung nodded.

The brothers spent the rest of the night reading over the site, saving any comments that they found interesting. The next day, while Jisung was at school, Sanghyuk went looking for any other fansites. He didn’t find many, but the handful that he did fine made him feel all warm inside. It was one thing for him to know he was doing the right thing, it was another for other people to tell him that he was right. He’d never admit it, but…..sometime he doubted what he was doing, how he was doing it. Sometime he wondered if he should have let it go, moved on and pretended he hadn’t seen what he’d seen.

This……this was exactly what he needed to hear.

The brothers took no small amount of pride in the fact that they were helping people see the truth. Every time someone credited them with showing them the light…….it made them feel good. But there was a down side to the sites, one neither had really thought about until they say it. Well, there were two down sides, one was just annoying and the other…….it was worrisome to say the least.

 

\--

 

“I can’t believe it,” Jisung said, eyes wide as he read over the post for the tenth time, “I really can’t.”

“Damn it,” Sanghyuk cursed, pacing the floor, “damn it, damn it, damn it!”

As much as the brother’s didn’t like seeing posts praising their looks and ignoring their message, they’d take that over……whatever the hell you called this.

“This can’t be good for our message, can it?” Jisung sighed, closing the laptop and pulling his knees up to his chin, “the news are gonna love this. Claim that we’re inspiring more murders to kill.”

“You’re right,” Sanghyuk hissed, “We need to put a stop to it. Make an example of some of these lunatics. Make it clear to everyone that we don’t support killing innocent people.”

“We can’t do anything if it’s just words,” Jisung pointed out, “we’d have to find the people acting out the words and……what? Are we gonna question every killer we find? Get their usernames and, like, leave messages saying ‘we killed them because they killed innocent people in our name.’ We….we can’t do something like that.”

“No,” Sanghyuk huffed, “you’re right. We can’t. but…..but maybe we can make these people killing in our name come to us?”

“Like,” the younger frowned, “message them, make them meet us and kill them there? But how do we know who’s killing and who isn’t? The cops check these sites too, no one would be stupid enough to post about their crimes here. And even if we could track them down, why would they believe that we are who we say we are?”

“I know,” Sanghyuk sighed, dropping down onto the couch beside his brother, “I know. I……I have no plan for this.”

“You’ll think of something,” Jisung assured his brother, “you always do.”

Sanghyuk smiled slightly at the younger, grateful that his brother was so confident in him.

As it turned out, they didn’t need a plan to draw those people to them. They always came searching for the brothers, looking for people who they thought could feed their twisted world view. The brothers were more than happy to end their killing streaks. Sometimes the psychos cursed them in their final moments, sometimes they seemed down right giddy at the idea of dying by their idols’ hands. That second reaction…..it never failed to leave the brothers’ skin crawling.

Those weren’t the only people who searched them out though. No, these people came offering aid. At first the brothers turned them down, they didn’t need help, but then……then the heroes found their place. Sanghyuk and Jisung had already been prepared for something like that to happen, had expected it to be honest, so all they needed to do was grab a couple of bags and run.

They took to living in an old, abandoned factory for a while before realizing that it didn’t make the best home. That was when the offers of aid became necessary. A place to stay for the night, food to eat, medical supplies when needed. Sanghyuk and Jisung made sure that the people helping them knew how thankful they were and each time the people responded by thanking them instead. Thanking them for opening their eyes.

These offers to help…….they were how the brothers met their friends, their family, as well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> when talking about the ‘fans’ who only see the killing and not the message, I couldn’t help but think of Toga from My Hero Academia. Like, Spinner totally got what Stain was trying to be about, that’s why *little spoiler* he kept Big Sis Mag from killing Deku during the summer training camp arc. Stain wanted to spare Deku, even went as far as saving him from the flying Nomu, thus Deku has to be a true hero and thus needs to live. But Toga……yeah. i kind of love her character, there's just something fun about her (and Twice for that matter) that makes me excited to see more of her, but dang is that girl crazy.


	4. Taekwoon

Taekwoon was young when his father died, only five and a half. He remembered watching the news as they talked about the battle, his mother crying behind him while cursing the name of the other hero involved. He hadn’t understood until a few years later what had happened, he’d believed the news because he was supposed to. His mother was a reporter and she said so. Everyone believed the news.

Taekwoon was almost twelve when his mother finally told him the truth. He’d come home from school, asking for a hero action figure for his birthday. The hero was the same one involved in his dad’s accident. His mother had gotten so angry, yelling at him for several minutes before she broke down crying. It was then that she explained the truth to him. When he didn’t believe her, she showed him proof. She’d had access to the uncut footage of the fight and saved a copy before she quit her job. She just couldn’t work with people who lied about her husband’s death, who had no problem saying that it was a horrible accident to her face when they knew the truth.

He’d been so angry after that. The bright child he had been died and was replaced with a silent, angry person. Taekwoon had withdrawn into himself, let his hate for the world consume him until he was alone. Save for his mother, the only person who understood his feelings. She’d once tried to get him to open up more, tried to tell him that it wasn’t the fault of the people who believed the lie. Taekwoon hadn’t listened and in time she gave up and let him be.

 

\--

 

“Hey,” one of his co-workers asked, “Jung, do you wanna go out for drinks with the rest of us?”

“I have plans with my mother,” Taekwoon lied, “thank you for the offer.”

“Maybe next time,” the other shrugged before leaving.

Taekwoon had gotten better about hiding his anger over the years, now he just appeared closed off. He was still angry, still hated the world with all his heart, but hiding it……it served him better. He needed a job after all. He needed to be able to work with people in order to keep that job. But that didn’t mean he had friends. He went out for drinks with co-workers every so often for the sake of appearance, but that was it.

Honestly, it made him feel a little sick to be around people like them. People who praised heroes and failed to see them for what they really were. Maybe his view was too harsh, he mother had once told him as much, but Taekwoon……..he’d thought that way for too long. He didn’t think he could ever change that part of himself.

 

\--

 

Taekwoon held back a yawn as he opened an e-mail from his mother. She didn’t normally use e-mail, so he was rather curious. It couldn’t be anything too important though, she’d have called him if it were. Still, the idea of what she could have sent him kept him from going straight to bed like he’d originally planned.

Taekwoon opened the e-mail to find a link.

He clicked the link and it took him to a web site.

His eyes widened as his read.

He didn’t watch the news, couldn’t take their lies, so he’d never heard of the Twin Flames until that moment. As he read through the site, he felt…….words couldn’t describe how he felt. It was like…….like nothing he’d felt before. These people……they were doing exactly what he’d always wanted.

Taekwoon had packed up his things, taking only what was really important to him, and went to find them.

 

\--

 

Taekwoon spent several months looking for the Twin Flames. Several times all he found was a dead end, but now……now he was looking at a run-down bar on the poorest side of the city. He hesitated entering the place, but decided that he had to see this through to the end. The Twin Flames had recently taken out the hero responsible for his father’s death, he had to find them and thank them. Maybe he’d even ask to join and they’d let him, but Taekwoon wanted to express his gratitude first and foremost.

“Can I help you?” the woman at the bar asked when he entered.

“I’m looking for someone,” Taekwoon replied, looking around at the mostly empty bar. The only people there were him, the woman, and two people tucked away in a dark corner.

“Oh?” the woman asked, frowning slightly, “who are you looking for?”

“The Twin Flames,” Taekwoon answered honestly. Something about the woman’s reaction told him she knew something, but she wouldn’t just tell him what she knew. He had to earn it.

“Why would you come looking for them here?” she pressed, “this isn’t exactly the first place you’d check for anyone, hero or villain.”

“I want to thank them,” Taekwoon said, “they avenged my dad and I need to thank them for that.”

“They avenged your dad, huh?” one of the people from the dark corner called out, “how did they do that?”

“The hero that they recently killed, “Taekwoon explained, “years ago he was fighting alongside my dad. He was a horrible hero, careless and foolish and selfish. He got my dad killed and he got away with it because he was more popular. My dad was a good man, he cared about saving people. He didn’t deserve to die like that.”

“Sounds like a pretty shitty dude,” the other person spoke up, “and you wanna thank the Twin Flames for taking him out?”

“I also want to join them,” Taekwoon said, “What they’re doing……it’s the right thing. The hero system is broken, there’s so many fake heroes running around. And the media…….they have the guts to lie about it.”

“You know,” the first person spoke again, “there’s a lot of people who’ve come around here saying the same kind of stuff. What makes you different from them? Why would the Twin Flames want you to help them?”

“I don’t know,” Taekwoon sighed, “I honestly don’t expect them to actually take my offer, but…….but I have to try. After my dad died…….after my mom told me the truth about it…….I……..I……I just…..I got so angry with everything. I stopped talking to people, stopped caring about things. This…..this is the first time I’ve felt anything good in years.”

“I know how you feel,” the person said, carefully getting out of his seat to reveal himself as the older of the Twin Flames, “I’ve been where you were.”

“Really?” Taekwoon asked, more surprised to hear that someone had gone through what he had than the reveal of who he’d been talking to, “you…..you know what it’s like?”

“Our mom,” the younger Twin spoke up, getting up as well, “she was killed because of a hero. Hyuk was there when it happened. So…..yeah, he really knows.”

“You know,” Hyuk said, “once you join us, you can’t go back. You’ll be branded a villain and heroes will start hunting you like they hunt us.”

“I know,” Taekwoon nodded, “I don’t care. Joining you…..I’ll be helping prevent more kids from losing their parents, from feeling what I’ve felt.”

“I’m Han Sanghyuk,” Sanghyuk introduced himself with a smile, “and this is my little brother Jisung. You?”

“I’m Jung Taekwoon,” Taekwoon replied, taking the hand that Sanghyuk offered.

“Welcome to the family,” Sanghyuk said and Taekwoon couldn’t help but smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so I actually had a little trouble trying to figure out what Taekwoon’s power should be since I needed something that would help Sanghyuk and Jisung while also fitting Taekwoon. So first I looked at my other stories where Taekwoon had a power (I might end up posting those here on Archive). Anyway, in one of those stories I gave him fire and another it was heat and neither really fit/helped Sanghyuk and Jisung. His power to enter dreams from another story didn’t help much either. So after that I’d thought “give him water, that would help them. His water could help them control their fire. Like, he’d keep them from catching buildings on fire, allowing them to go all out on enemies.” But then I got to thinking…..isn’t that a little basic? So I went with ice! He can still help the Han bros by protecting buildings from their flames, and it fits Taekwoon better. Like, ice is cold until you warm it up and Taekwoon was all quiet and reserved, some would even say…..cold, when VIXX debuted but he’s warmed up since and become more open.


	5. Woojin

Woojin was just a normal kid. He had parents who worked normal job; his mother was a doctor and his father owned a small music store. He’d inherited his mother’s healing powers and had struggled to decide if he wanted to help people like she did or go pursue something related to music before deciding to go to college for music. He had friends, he played video games, and he got pretty good grades. His parents loved him and wanted him to do whatever made him happy. No one he knew had died because of a hero or villain.

All this……it made it rather strange when he started following the activities of a villain duo known as Twin Flames.

He’d received a link to a Twin Flames fan site from a classmate, the context being ‘can you believe these weirdos backing these villains?’. He couldn’t. Not at first anyway. Woojin had never really been that into heroes. Sure, he thought that they were cool and he had some action figured from when he was a kid, but music and healthcare had always been more interesting for him. Especially music. But even if he wasn’t that into heroes, he still thought that they were, well, heroes. Thus, supporting villains was……weird.

For some reason, he kept reading the site, reading through the comments. Something…….something clicked in his head as he read what the people were saying. So, behind closed doors, Woojin started doing his own research. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for exactly, but after a few months he found it. Proof that heroes weren’t always so heroic. Lots of it. Enough that Woojin felt sick that he’d never noticed it before.

This left him with a big question though. Now that he knew the truth, what was he going to do? It was pretty clear that he couldn’t go to just anyone with this. His father had called the Twin Flames and their new teammate scum. His friends had brushed them off as just worthless villains who needed to die already. His mother though……he saw the look she got on her face when the villain team was brought up. She never said anything, but……he wondered what she knew.

Woojin didn’t get a chance to confront her about it.

He’d been heading home after his last class when he saw blue flames shoot up into the sky a few blocks away. He didn’t know why he did it, but he decided to see what was going on. He pushed through people running away from the battle and eventually found the Twin Flames and the new teammate fighting against a couple of heroes. The fight was going in the villain’s favor until one of the heroes pulled a gun and shot the younger Flame.

“Jisung!” the older yelled, clearly panicked, before turning and charging at the heroes.

They didn’t stand a chance against the elder Flame’s anger. Woojin watched with wide eyes as the older Flame turned the heroes to ash before rushing the Jisung’s side. Their new teammate was already there, trying to stop the bleeding.

“Hey,” Flame said, voice soft as he tried to get Jisung to open his eyes, “Jisunggie, open your eyes for me. Please, little squirrel, I need you to stay awake.”

“I can’t stop the bleeding,” the new guy reported, “Sanghyuk, we need to find a healer or something fast. Do you know anyone who can help?”

“No,” Sanghyuk said, cursing as he punched the ground.

Woojin watched for a moment longer before deciding what to do.

“I’m a healer,” he called, rushing to join the three, “I can fix him.”

“Who are you?” Sanghyuk hissed, “How do we know you are what you say you are?”

“I promise you,” Woojin replied, “I can fix him.”

“You better,” Sanghyuk growled, moving away slightly so that Woojin could get closer to Jisung.

Woojin took a deep breath before starting his work. He silently wished he had gone the healthcare route for school, then maybe he’d been healing Jisung………faster……easier…….something. He was doing fine, Jisung was going to be fine, it was just……he could be doing better!

“We’ve got people coming,” Sanghyuk suddenly announced, “Taekwoon, get the car. Kid, can you heal on the go?”

“Yeah,” Woojin nodded, “the worst is over anyway.”

“Doesn’t even hurt,” Jisung muttered, eyes still closed but he’d gotten some colour back in his face.

“Let’s go then,” Sanghyuk decided, picking up his brother and following Taekwoon to the car.

Woojin didn’t hesitate to follow them.

 

\--

 

“They didn’t see you,” Sanghyuk said later that night as he and Woojin watched the news, “good. You can go home.”

They group had ended up at the apartment of some guy named……..Woojin didn’t know. Sanghyuk had called him a friend and left it at that. They’d set Jisung up in the guest bedroom and Woojin had gotten right to work fixing the last of the damage. The guy who owned the apartment had gotten take-out for everyone and they all ate together, minus Jisung who was sleeping like a log. The three older men had talked about the fight, nothing too detailed though, and Woojin ate in silence, just thinking about everything.

Now, Taekwoon was keeping watch over Jisung who’d woken up briefly to eat before going back to sleep. The apartment’s owner was sleeping in his own room and Woojin was sitting with Sanghyuk, watching as the news recapped the fight from before.

“I guess,” Woojin nodded, “but……I don’t know if I want to.”

“What are you talking about?” Sanghyuk asked, looking Woojin over carefully.

“I read one of your fan sites,” he explained, “read through everything and then I did some searching of my own.”

“Ah,” Sanghyuk nodded in understanding, “you’ve opened your eyes to the truth.”

“No one I know can see it,” Woojin admitted, “or they don’t want to. Well, my mom might. She’s a doctor so…..she might know something.”

“But you’ve never asked her,” Sanghyuk said, “probably because you’re scared of the answer you’ll get, right?”

“What about you?” Woojin suddenly asked, “why……what happened to you to make you realize that heroes could be so……corrupt?”

“My mom was killed by one of the top heroes,” Sanghyuk replied, eyes getting a distant look in them as he recounted his past, “The only ones who lived were me and some other guy. He took whatever they offered him for his silence and my dad promised he’d keep me quiet when they threatened me and Jisung.”

“A top hero, huh?” Woojin scowled.

He’d never imagined that the corruption went that far. Most of what he’d found had involved lower ranked heroes, those who didn’t have as much power and thus couldn’t keep their wrong doings as quiet as others. But Woojin didn’t doubt Sanghyuk’s words. It made sense that the top heroes would be corrupt, too. If those at the top were good, why would they let those at the bottom be evil?

“You seem like a nice guy,” Sanghyuk said after a moment, “and I……I really don’t want to drag you into this kind of life. So….if you’re trying to figure out what to do, I suggest you go home. You don’t have to forget all of this, but……you have a life outside of this. Me, Jisung , and Taekwoon…….not so much.”

“But you need a healer,” Woojin pointed out, “I can do that.” He paused, “and……I might not be involved right now, but how long with that last? How long before someone I care about dies because of fake heroes? Before I get killed because of them?”

Sanghyuk regarded him for a long moment before suggesting that he sleep on it for a few days. He gave Woojin some contact information so that he could find them if need be before giving him bus money and sending him home.

 

\--

 

Woojin did ask asked and spent several weeks thinking things over. Every time he thought he’d made up his mind, something happened to remind him what he would lose or risk if he picked one side or the other. Eventually though, he made up his mind.

One of the top heroes made an appearance at his college to talk to the students. Most of what he talked about was clearly directed at people who supported the Twin Flames. Woojin sat through the whole thing doing his best not to scream. See, after his talk with Sanghyuk, he’d looked up the incident the older man had talked about. This hero talking shit about Sanghyuk and the one who killed his mother were one in the same. The only difference was that the hero was higher ranked now, second place soon to be number one in fact.

After that, Woojin went home and grabbed everything that mattered to him. On the way out he crossed paths with his mother. They didn’t say anything for a long time, just looked at each other. Her eyes told him everything he needed to know. She knew the truth, she knew that he knew as well.

“Be careful,” was all she told him before pulling him into a tight hug, “please.”

“I’ll come back one day,” Woojin promised, “when all of this is over.”

“I love you, sweetie.”

“I love you too, mom.”

And with that, Woojin left to join his new family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so I knew I needed someone to have a healing power. My first though was one of our wonderful leaders, Hakyeon or Chan. But I already had plans for them making this not an option. Then I took one look at Woojin and…….yeah. Just look at that sweet teddy bear and tell me and healing doesn't totally fit him. haha kind of a no shit moment for me. I’m really happy I decided to give Woojin a backstory of “he was just a normal guy with a normal life who decided to help what he felt was a worthy cause”. Like, I feel it serves an important purpose in the story. See, if everyone has a horribly painful backstory with dead parents and junk, then it just gets a bit……..i feel it ruins the story ‘cuz then every backstory is like “oh, another dead parents. Guess we’re Disney now” or something like that.


	6. Chan and Felix

Bang Chan met Lee Felix at school. It honestly wasn’t too hard to find him. He overheard the other kids in his class talking about another ‘villain to be’ and went to find the kid at lunch. Felix was alone, like Chan expected, and he flinched when the older boy sat down beside him.

“I’m Chan,” he smiled slightly, “what’s your name?”

“You shouldn’t sit here,” Felix replied, looking down sadly, “they’ll hate you, too.”

“They already hate me, mate,” Chan shrugged, “pretty sure that they can’t hate me anymore no matter what I do.”

“What do you mean?” Felix asked, looking up with wide eyes.

“I’m like you,” Chan smiled kindly, “they call me a villain, too.”

Felix had started to cry, overjoyed to meet someone like him. Someone who knew exactly how he felt. His parents tried, but……they weren’t dangerous like him. They could never understand how he felt, not like Chan could.

“I’m Felix,” the younger smiled, “it’s nice to meet you.”

After that, the pair became inseparable.

 

\--

 

“Keep running,” Chan yelled, ducking under a pipe as the pair ran through an old factory with a hero hot on their tail.

All they wanted was to be heroes, to prove that they were good. But no one ever believed them, even when they were clearly trying to help. When Chan and Felix had crossed paths with a hero, Chan had foolishly believed that talking to the hero could get them the support they wanted. After all, this was a hero. Things……well, Chan could have never imagined how things would turn out.

How was he supposed to know that the ‘hero’ would decide to kill them, that ‘villains’ like them should be killed before they could do anything?

“I’m trying,” Felix panted, stumbling slightly as he tried to keep up.

Chan bit back a sob as he ran. This was all his fault! He was the one who had talked Felix into trying to be a hero. The younger had been content with living a quiet life, with letting his dreams of being a hero stay just that; dreams. If he’d just let Felix do that…….if he’d just done that…….if he’d never approached the hero……

His sweet, kind, loving best friend was going to die because of him.

“Chan!” Felix suddenly yelled and Chan turned to find that Felix had tripped, getting tangled up in some of the junk laying around.

“Felix,” Chan panicked, rushing to help his best friend and baby brother, “it’s alright, I’m here. I’ll get you out, I promise.”

“He’s coming,” Felix told him, fighting back his sobs, “Chan, he……Chan, you need to go.”

“No way!” Chan snapped, “I’m not going to leave you to die, Lix. We’re both going to survive this, I promise you. I’m not going to leave you behind.”

“Chan,” Felix didn’t bother hiding his sobs, resting his head against the older boy’s shoulder as he slumped in defeat.

Chan forced himself to focus on freeing his friend. He couldn’t give up, he couldn’t let this ‘hero’ kill them. They needed to live! At the very least, he needed Felix to live. The younger boy could not die here, there was too much he needed to do with his life.

The hero turned the corner and saw them and Chan’s heart sunk.

“I’m sorry,” his whispered, resting his own head on Felix’s shoulder and letting himself cry, “I’m so sorry.”

The hero got closer and Felix turned slightly in his arms, turned to face the coming danger. Death didn’t come and after a few seconds Chan looked up to see why. He froze as he watched the hero turning to ash, Felix’s left hand pressed against what had once been the hero’s chest. Felix was crying even harder as he watched the hero die, body shaking in Chan’s arms.

“Felix,” Chan breathed as the hero turned into a pile of ash.

“I’m sorry,” Felix managed to say through his cries, “I know I shouldn’t have, but…….but…..”

“It’s ok,” Chan was quick to assure his friend, “it’s going to be alright. You didn’t have a choice, Lix. He was going to kill us.”

“No one will see it that way,” Felix argued, “I’m a murderer now, they’ll lock me up and never let me out.” He hugged Chan tightly, “I’m a villain, just like they said I would be.”

“No!” Chan snapped, “you aren’t a villain, Felix! You could never be a villain. You did what you had to do. And…..and they have to catch you first.”

“Chan?” Felix questioned, “what……what are you thinking?”

“We’re going home,” Chan said, “pack only want you need. Then we’re leaving.”

Leaving was an easy decision. The only living people who cared about them were Felix’s parents. Once they told them about what happened, they gave the boys some money and suggested a place where they could hide for a while. With one last hug from both Felix’s mom and dad, the pair was gone. Chan promised Felix that they’d try to come back one day, but both knew that this was an empty promise. They were never going to come back to Australia.

 

\--

 

“Chan,” Felix yawned as he exited his room, “what are you still doing up?”

“Reading this site,” Chan replied, smiling softly at Felix’s bedhead, “I think I know where we’re going next.”

Once the pair started running, they never stopped. It would seem that killing a hero made you special in the eyes of other heroes, made them look for you with extreme prejudice. The pair had been forced to fight and kill several heroes as a result, making even more want to come for them. At current, they’d moved into a really shitty apartment in some really shitty New York neighborhood. It was all just……really shitty, but the owner asked for cash and nothing else and no one on the block looked at them twice.

“What are you talking about?” Felix asked, cuddling up beside the older and resting his head on Chan’s lap.

“Korea,” Chan replied, brushing his fingers through the younger’s blond hair, “we’re going to Korea.”

“Why?” Felix pressed.

“There’s someone there that I think might be able to help us,” Chan told him, “I think it’s worth trying.” He looked down at the tied boy in his lap, “go back to sleep, sweetie. We can talk more about this tomorrow.”

“Can’t,” Felix replied, “nightmares.”

Chan frowned slightly at that. He knew exactly what the nightmares were about and he hated the world for its part in causing them. If the universe had just given the sweet sunshine boy that was Felix a better power, something that wasn’t seen as villainous……. With a sigh, Chan started to sing softly and within seconds Felix was asleep.

Chan watched the younger sleep for a few moments, smiling softly, before carefully picking him up and moving him to the bedroom. With Felix tucked in, he wondered if he should start making travel arrangements now or not. Chan fought back a yawn, looking at the clock before deciding to just go to bed as well.

 

\--

 

“This should be the place,” Chan hummed, looking around at the building.

“It’s not bad,” Felix remarked, “looks promising at least.”

The last place the Aussie pair had gone looking for the Twin Flames and their teammates……well, they’d know the second they arrived that they’d gotten a bad tip. But now they were looking at a bar, one where the lights were clearly on. Sure, it looked pretty run down, but lights! That meant people were inside, people who might be the people that they were looking for.

“Let’s go inside,” Chan said, turning to fix Felix’s coat and scarf, “before you freeze.” Felix really wasn’t good with the cold, so much so that Chan always started to worry for him when the temperature started dropping.

“Chan,” Felix huffed, smiling slightly, “I’m alright, don’t worry. Like you said, let’s just go in.”

“Ok,” Chan nodded, taking Felix’s hand and leading him inside.

“Welcome,” said the young man behind the counter of the bar, “can I help you?” He smiled kindly at them and Chan was struck for a moment at how soft he looked. Like a teddy bear.

“We’re looking for someone,” Chan replied, “and we were told that we could find them here.”

“Oh?” the man frowned slightly and Chan could almost swear that he tensed slightly, “who might that be?”

“The Twin Flames,” Felix spoke up, stumbling slightly over the unfamiliar Korean words, “we were told to……..to find them here.” Chan couldn’t help but smile slightly over Felix’s pronunciation. Apparently, the same could be said for the other guy, too.

“Well,” he said, “that depends on why you’re looking for them.”

“We want their help,” Chan said, “or to join or……or something like that.”

“What do you need their help with?” the man asked, “Why would you want to join them? I mean, you look a little worse for wear, but….not bad enough to wanna join villains. Or at least what the news calls villains.” That last part was muttered under the guy’s breath and Chan almost missed it, but after hearing it…….well, he knew he was in the right place. If not, well, then he was at least heading in the right direction.

“Our powers,” Chan explained, “they…..well….”

“ _People think we’re evil_ ,” Felix frowned and even though he said it in English, the guy seemed to understand.

“What are you talking about?” he questioned, frowning slightly himself.

Felix pulled off one of his special gloves and grabbed a glass from a nearby table, turning it to ash instantly. The guy’s eyes widened slightly and Chan backed up slightly, putting himself directly in front of Felix incase the guy tried anything.

“Sanghyuk!” the guy yelled, “can you come out here please?”

“What’s wrong?” Sanghyuk asked, coming out of the backroom. He paused when he saw Chan and Felix, glancing over at the guy behind the counter. Chan and Felix froze as well, eyes wide as they realized who Sanghyuk was.

“They want to join,” the guy explained.

“Lots of people do, Woojin,” Sanghyuk countered, “what makes them so special? Why should I accept them into the family?”

“Their powers,” Woojin nodded towards the ash in Felix’s hand, “or at least that kid’s power.”

“What about their powers?” Sanghyuk pressed, clearly directing his question at anyone who could answer it.

“Felix can turn whatever he touches to ash,” Chan spoke up, “anything his hands comes into full contact with.” He grabbed Felix’s still covered hand to show off the glove that only covered three of his fingers.

“And what about you?” Sanghyuk asked, “what can you do?”

“My power is called siren,” Chan explained, “When I sing, I can control people. Put them to sleep, hypnotize them……whatever. It works when I talk, but not as well.”

“Sounds useful,” Sanghyuk nodded in understanding, taking a seat as the bar and taking the drink that Woojin offered him, “but why come to us? Surely you’d rather use those powers to be heroes, right?”

“Heroes tried to kill us,” Felix said, “we…… _they thought we would be villains, so this one hero tried to kill us before we could do anything. I…..I killed him and now……now we’ve got a lot more heroes who want us dead_.” Chan quickly translated when he noticed the slightly confused looks on Sanghyuk and Woojin’s faces.

“How old are you?” Sanghyuk asked after a moment.

“I’m twenty,” Chan said, “and Felix is three years younger than me. We….we’ve been running for the last three or four years.”

“Son of a bitch,” Sanghyuk cursed as Woojin’s jaw dropped slightly, “killing children………fucking hell.”

“Sanghyuk,” Woojin looked at his leader, silently pleading with him to take the pair in. Not that he needed to. After hearing that, there was no way Sanghyuk wasn’t gonna bring the pair into the fold.

“Yeah,” Sanghyuk nodded in agreement, “yeah. You two…..you’re in. You’re part of our family now.”

Felix started to tear up at the idea of finally being safe, of having a family again, and Chan wasn’t too far behind him.

 

\--

 

“Jisung!” Felix yelled, chasing after the older, by less than twenty four hours, boy, “give that back!”

“No way!” Jisung laughed, dodging his best friend, “you gotta catch me first, Lix.”

Sanghyuk and Chan sat at the dining room table, smiling softly as they watched their brothers playing. Taekwoon and Woojin were doing dishes in the kitchen, laughing as they talked about their shared passion; music. Sanghyuk took a moment to look around at his little family and felt happier then he’d felt in years. These……these were the most important people in his life. With them by his side he could do anything.

Like change the world, change it so that heroes were actually heroic and no one was called a villain because they had a certain power.

Jisung paused his movement when he noticed his brother’s smile, Felix crashing into him seconds later.

“What’s wrong?” Felix asked, looking between Jisung and Sanghyuk.

“Nothing,” Jisung replied, smiling softly, “I just…….it’s been a long time since he looked this happy.”

“Yeah,” Felix nodded, noticing how calm and relaxed Chan was, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen Chan look like that.”

“I’m glad,” Jisung told his best friend, “that you found us. That Taekwoonie and Woojinnie found us, too. I’m glad you’re our family.”

“Same,” Felix grinned, throwing his arms around Jisung and hugging him tightly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> : so something I didn’t manage to work in here is some more detail about Felix’s power and gloves. First off: his power. So I said he could turn anything his hand(s) came into full contact (all four fingers, thumb, and palm) with to ash. Once he touches something, like a person, it’s almost like he infects it. Even if he instantly pulls his hand away, whatever he touched will completely turn to dust. The more contact he has and/or the longer he touches something for, the quicker it will turn to ash.   
> As for his gloves…..  
> So when his power first developed, his parents started getting him regular gloves. Well, I mean they got some pretty nice quality gloves, but they were that basic end-at-the-wrist-cover-all-four-fingers-and-thumb type gloves. His mom would alter them slightly to leave a finger or two uncovered so he didn’t turn them to ash, too. When Chan and Felix ran away, they didn’t have much cash so whenever Felix needed new gloves they had to settle for really crap quality stuff. But after joining Sanghyuk and co. they were able to get some really nice, mid-bicep length gloves.  
> See, Felix was messing around with Jisung one day. At some point, he noticed that one of his gloves had started coming off and he freaked out, terrified of hurting his best friend. Sanghyuk went out the next day and got him a bunch of new gloves, all different lengths. Felix ended up sticking to a pair that ended mid-bicep when at home, but on missions he wears a normal pair of gloves since that’s easier to take off.


	7. Wonsik

Wonsik had never really had money, but he wasn’t broke and homeless. He just…..wasn’t rich enough for heroes to give a damn about him. The heroes never seemed to give much of a damn about people like him, not unless there was a good photo opportunity in it for them. Something that could make them look good.

Maybe that was why he’d never thought twice about throwing his support behind the Twin Flames.

He’d opened his door to the brothers without hesitation. He’d smiled warmly and offered up his apartment again after Taekwoon had joined them. He’d cooked them dinner when Woojin showed up to heal Jisung. He would have been there to welcome Chan and Felix, but his apartment was destroyed by a hero a few months before hand.

“Such bullshit,” Wonsik muttered as he dug through a trashcan.

The stupid ‘hero’ didn’t want to pay for rebuilding his building. The fucker’s management had scoffed when Wonsik tried to confront them about it, told him exactly what he already knew; no one cared about poor people. The ‘hero’ had done so much good that no one would listen to someone like Wonsik. If he still tried to talk, well……..Wonsik didn’t have a clean history. A minor drug charge or two could easily turn into something more…….image tarnishing.

Honestly, Wonsik didn’t know why he expected anything less. He’d considered using his powers on them, considered making them feel bad about what they had done to him and everyone else who had lived in the building, but that would only get him into trouble. He could picture the headlines way too easily.

Wonsik had done what anyone would do; give up. He put together a small bag of what he could salvage and took to living on the streets. It wasn’t okay. It was horrible and he hated it, but it could have been worse. Of course the universe apparently had heard that thought and decided to make it worse by giving south Korea an early, cold winter. Wonsik had known that he’d have to find a warm place eventually, but……that was eventually, he hadn’t gotten anything in place yet!

Now….now he was going to freeze to death.

“Hey,” a voice called from the mouth of the alley, “what are you doing?”

“Nothing that concerns you!” Wonsik snapped, turning to glare at the person only to freeze when he saw who it was, “S-Sanghyuk?”

“Wonsik?” Sanghyuk blinked in confusion, “what are you doing out here at this time of night? And….and what’s up with your clothes?” He looked Wonsik over harder, “are…….Wonsik…..what happened?”

“Can we…..can we talk about this someplace else?” Wonsik asked, hating the concern he felt from Sanghyuk since the other man had enough to worry about, “someplace warm?”

 

\--

 

“Oh my god!” Felix yelled, forgetting his Korean in his anger, “that…..that….. _that is such bullshit! How can you even do something like that to someone and not even think twice about it_!”

“Not shocking,” Taekwoon huffed, “sad as it is to say.”

“So you really don’t have any place to go?” Woojin asked, making sure that Wonsik got the lion’s share of the meal he’d cooked.

“No,” Wonsik sighed, “and it’s gotten so cold out recently, I…….”

“You can stay with us," Sanghyuk said, “This building is our permanent base of operations now. It’s clearly got room for one more.”

Sanghyuk had recently gotten sick of living out of a suitcase, so he’d found the group a place to stay for good. The others were pretty sure that Sanghyuk wasn’t actually sick of it, he just wanted Chan and Felix to have a permanent home for once. The place he’d found them was an old apartment building. It was kind of on the run down side, but nothing that couldn’t be fixed. The owner was a friend, so they got to rent the whole building super cheap. That didn’t mean that they actually paid that amount though, they always slipped the owner a few extra bucks. They also fixed the place up bit by bit out of their own pocket.

“I couldn’t ask you to do that,” Wonsik replied, “it’s too much.”

“You’ve given us a place to sleep how many times?” Jisung spoke up, “and yet this is too much? Dude, we’re just repaying the favor.”

“You can help me at the bar, too,” Woojin suggested, “I could use the help.”

The woman who’d run the bar where Taekwoon met the Han brothers had been badly hurt because of a hero. When she revealed that she couldn’t run her bar anymore, Sanghyuk felt it was only right to help her out as thanks for all she had done for them. Even though she’d signed the whole thing over to the group, Sanghyuk insisted that half of their profits went to her. She had medication to pay for after all.

“You can use your paycheck to pay us back,” Sanghyuk offered, noticing that the other was still a little hesitant, “and you can use your power to help us. I know Felix has nightmares that Chan can’t always help him with.” Felix nodded in agreement at that. He didn’t know what Wonsik’s power was, but anything that could help him get away from his nightmares was welcome.

“Ok,” Wonsik finally nodded, “ok.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another member of the group who doesn’t have a horrible, painful backstory. It’s nice to have that show up haha. I was worried that giving them a whole apartment building was a little much, but then I got to thinking and it seemed fine. I mean, it’s not that big of a building (it IS on the poor, shittyer side of the city) and they’re gonna end up with a bunch of members. Now the bar was kind of a no-brainer. They were already using it so much, why not just give it to them. Gives them a way to make money too, so they aren’t relying on others for every little thing.


	8. Jeongin

Jeongin didn’t remember his parents. He didn’t remember going to school or playing with friends. He didn’t remember much outside of his cell and the experiments. He did remember that one of the older kids talked about heroes coming to save them. He didn’t know what heroes were, but they had to be something good based on how the other kid talked about them. But heroes never came and the older kid died or went insane.

Heroes weren’t coming to save them.

No one was.

Jeongin was sure that he was going to die or go insane in his little cell.

 

\--

 

“Are you kidding me!” Chan snapped, “How could they do this? Just turn a blind eye to something like this?”

“You should know by now,” Taekwoon replied, “the people only know about what the news talks about. If the news isn’t talking about missing orphans, then…….”

“It’s so wrong,” Chan sighed, slumping in his seat, “I….I feel sick.”

“We all do,” Jisung replied, hugging Felix as the sensitive boy cried. He was close to crying as well, but held it together because Felix needed him to be strong. He’d cry later when it was just him and Sanghyuk.

“Well,” Sanghyuk said, “if the heroes won’t do anything, then we will.”

“Why aren’t they doing something?” Woojin asked, “You’d think that saving a bunch of kids would be a great photo opportunity.”

“From what Taekwoon and I can tell,” Wonsik frowned, “some of the money funding these experiments comes from some big name heroes. Number 3 seems to have the strongest tie to the whole thing.” He paused, “honestly, that kind of explains how he rose from 43 to 3 within a couple of years.”

“How soon can we attack?” Sanghyuk asked, “I want those kids out of there by the end of the week.”

“We can do that,” Taekwoon smiled slightly, handing over a floor plan he’d managed to dig up for the building in question, “you and Chan just need to come up with a battle plan.”

“We’ll have one by tomorrow,” Chan promised.

“Better get some coffee going, Woojin,” Sanghyuk smiled at the younger, “we’re gonna need it.”

“Got it,” Woojin nodded, “just don’t overwork yourselves. We need you both at one hundred percent.”

 

\--

 

They performed the raid a couple of days later and what they found…….it was worse than they could have imagined.

Wonsik had to be taken out at one point, the feelings of the captive children too much for him to deal with. Felix hadn’t stuck around very long after they cleared the building, Jisung going with him since he also couldn’t stomach what they had seen. Woojin clearly wanted to run from the horrific sight, but he needed to be there to help whoever he could. Chan, Sanghyuk, and Taekwoon held in their feelings better, but they all knew that they were destined for many sleepless nights.

There were only a handful of children alive and most of them had clearly been driven mad by what had happened to them. Sanghyuk didn’t know if they would ever be able to regain their sanity, but….but he had to try. They deserved someone trying to help them. The group had honestly lost hope of finding anyone alive and sane when Chan found Jeongin.

“Hello?” Chan said, carefully opening the door to the cage. He didn’t know what the young boy would do and he really didn’t want to hurt him if he attacked.

“Hello,” Jeongin replied, voice strained due to lack of use, “who are you?”

“I’m Chan,” the older replied, “who are you?”

“Jeongin.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Jeongin,” Chan smiled, relieved to find at least one child who was alright, “do you want to come with me?”

“I don’t know,” Jeongin replied, “where……where are you going? Where would you take me?”

“Far away from here,” Chan told him, promised him, “someplace where you’ll never be hurt again.”

“Are you a hero?” Jeongin asked after a long moment.

“No.”

Jeongin took Chan’s hand without a second of hesitation after that.

 

\--

 

“Ah!” Jeongin yelled, curling up in a ball as things flew through the air over his head.

“Jeongin!” Wonsik yelled, rushing into the room, “what’s wrong?”

“I-I don’t know,” the young boy sobbed, “I don’t know.”

Wonsik carefully made it over to the child, using his power to calm him down once he had Jeongin wrapped up in a hug. As he relaxed, the things that had been flying around started to drop. Sanghyuk stood at the doorway, keeping the others back until he was sure no one was going to get knocked upside the head with a coffee mug. When he finally let the others through, Chan and Woojin were the first inside.

“You cut yourself,” Woojin frowned, getting right to work fixing the youngest up.

“Sorry,” Jeongin whispered, looking down at his hands sadly, “I….I don’t know what happened.”

“It’s ok,” Chan assured him, “it’s alright, don’t blame yourself.”

“The one to blame are the ones who experimented on you,” Sanghyuk frowned as he kneed down beside the youngest, brushing his fingers through Jeongin’s hair in what he hoped was a soothing gesture, “whatever they did to you increased your power.”

“What do we do?” Chan asked, clearly worried about what was going to happen to the young boy and his sanity.

“We’re going to need to work with him,” Taekwoon recommended, “help him control his power.”

“Would that work?” Jisung questioned, “I mean, who’s the best one to help? Shouldn’t it be someone with a similar power?”

“I know someone,” Sanghyuk said, “they can help. At the very least they can give us a place to start.”

“Call them,” Woojin said as he finished healing Jeongin.

 

\--

 

“Sanghyuk,” Jeongin said, taking a seat beside his leader later that night.

“Shouldn’t you be sleeping?” Sanghyuk teased, ruffling the younger’s hair, “today was rough and you need to rest.”

“Do you think I’ll be able to control it?” Jeongin asked, cuddling Sanghyuk’s side.

“I know you will,” Sanghyuk replied, “we all do. Do you know why?”

“Why?”

“Because you’re strong,” Sanghyuk told him, “one of the strongest people I know. Heck, you might actually be the strongest person I know. People like that, like you, always come out alright.” He pulled the younger into a tight hug, “and because you have all of us here to support you and love you no matter what.”

Jeongin looked at the other for a moment before smiling brightly. He might not remember his original family, but this one……this family he had with Sanghyuk and Chan and Woojin and everyone……this was the only family he wanted.

“I love you,” Jeongin said, “big brother. Is…..is it alright to call you that?”

“Perfectly fine,” Sanghyuk replied, “and I love you too, little fox.”

Jeongin fell asleep like that, cuddled up with his leader. He woke up to Jisung and Felix cuddled with him, Woojin and Wonsik making the group breakfast, and the others sitting around the dining table planning the next mission. He felt himself smiling softly as he looked around at his family before getting up.

“Big brother,” Jeongin grinned, hugging Sanghyuk tightly, “when’s the food gonna be ready.”

“Big brother?” Chan asked, faking hurt that Jeongin hadn’t called him that.

Jeongin laughed happily.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> : I feel so horrible doing this to poor Jeongin. Like, he’s such a sweetheart (his smile will never stop turning me to mush), and here I am giving him THIS backstory. I’m not a good person, am I?


	9. Hyunjin

Hyunjin had spent his life trying to hide, to avoid people noticing him.  He didn’t mind it when he was younger, didn’t understand why his mother would cry over it. She would apologize over and over for making him live like that and he always told her it was fine, he was happy just being with her. That always made her smile, but as he got older he came to understand that it was a forced smile. That his words actually hurt her more.

Hyunjin only found out why he had to hide and avoid others when his mother died. He was in his early teens by then, old enough to understand everything but young enough to be unable to do anything. With his mother dead, he was put into the system, just another orphan in the eyes of society. Except he wasn’t just another orphan. His power, dubbed medusa in his paperwork, was deemed too dangerous by everyone and he was hated and shunned for it.

He hated it, hated the other kids, more than anything. They beat him until he couldn’t move. They told him horrible things, said he was something evil and should die. It wasn’t right! It wasn’t fair! He didn’t do anything wrong! So one day he did something horrible and turned one of his attackers to stone. The other teen had been in the middle of beating him, had already broken his arm and bruised him so badly that the wounds took ages to heal. It wasn’t the first time either, not even close.

All Hyunjin did was open his eyes.

Honestly, he was just defending himself.

He realized afterwards that no one would see things his way, that he was going to get into so much trouble. So he ran. He got up and just ran as fast and as far as his legs could take him. Eventually he stopped running and decided to do what his mother had taught him; hide. He found something to cover his eyes and took to living on the streets. It wasn’t easy and he lost count of how many times he almost died, mostly due to weather since he could turn anyone who attacked him to stone, but he survived.

He just……survived.

 

\--

 

“Jisung,” Felix huffed, trying to keep up with the young flame villain, “slow down!”

“No way,” Jisung laughed, charging on ahead.

Felix cursed to himself. Normally he could keep up with his friend, but that was when he was at one hundred percent. A few days prior, Felix and Taekwoon had gone on a little job for Sanghyuk. It wasn’t anything too intense, but Felix did get roughed up a bit. He’d refused Woojin’s healing, insisting that he was alright. He really wasn’t, he figured that something had been done to his ribs, but Woojin had just looked so tired. Felix could make him drain his energy more.

Turned out he really should have gotten Woojin’s help because his ribs really hurt.

Felix paused, trying to catch his breath. That was when he noticed the homeless guy stumbling along the sidewalk ahead of him. He had a cloth or something covering his eyes and Felix wondered if he was blind. His heart hurt for the man and he didn’t hesitate to go help him.

“Hello,” Felix smiled slightly, “are you alright?”

“W-who?” the man startled and Felix froze for a moment, taken a bit off-guard at how young the man sounded. Looking at him closely, Felix was very surprised and saddened to realize the man was about his age. He hated seeing someone so young on the streets. He knew from personal experience and from Wonsik how horrible living like that was.

“I wanted to know if you needed any help,” Felix said.

Before the man could say anything, Jisung came running back. The slightly older ‘villain’ cursed as he saw Felix talking to a stranger. Felix was just too kind hearted sometimes. They couldn’t trust everyone, not when the fake heroes were starting to drop some serious coin for tips on where to find the Twin Flames and their allies. The homeless guy Felix was talking to could easily turn on them and Jisung refused to let his best friend get hurt.

“Felix,” he snapped, putting himself between the two, “what do you think you’re doing?”

“I’m just trying to help,” Felix pouted, “he can’t see, Sunggie.”

“How do you know?” Jisung challenged, “It could be an act.”

“Hey!” the homeless man snapped, clearly not liking Jisung’s tone or what he was implying, “I’ve done nothing wrong here!”

“Stay out of this,” Jisung growled.

“Jisung,” Felix scowled, “stop it.”

“No way,” Jisung turned his glare to Felix, “you’re too trusting, Lix. It’s going to get you hurt.”

Before Felix could argue back, someone else showed up. Multiple someones.

“It’s one of the Twin Flames!” one of them shouted, “and Ash!”

“Get them!” another said, “the heroes will pay big for even one of them.”

“Shit,” Jisung hissed, pushing Felix behind him and getting ready to burn the group down to nothing.

But before he could do anything the homeless guy had yanked down the cloth covering his eyes and turned the group to stone. He quickly covered his eyes back up and tried to get away, but the ‘villain’ pair had already seen what he’d done.

“You’re like me,” Felix said, causing the homeless man, Hyunjin, to freeze.

“W-what do you mean?” he asked, turning to face Felix as best he could with his impaired vision.

“I turn whatever I touch to ash,” Felix said, taking a careful step towards Hyunjin, “I….you……” He paused, trying to find the right Korean words, “did they call you a villain growing up, too?”

“Felix,” Jisung snapped before Hyunjin could respond, “I can here sirens, heroes are gonna be here soon. We’ve got to go!”

“Wait just a second,” Felix said before returning his attention to Hyunjin, “come with us?”

He grabbed Hyunjin’s hand in a loose hold. If the other boy wanted to come with them, he only needed to tighten his grip. If he wanted to go, to never see them again……Felix would let him go. He wanted Hyunjin to come with them. Their family was always ready to welcome others who’d been wronged by heroes and society, but if that wasn’t what the other wanted……

“Felix!” Jisung yelled, clearly pleading with his friend to start moving.

Hyunjin hesitated for a second longer before tightening his hold on Felix’s hand and letting the other boy take him wherever he wanted. He didn’t know exactly why he’d accepted the other’s offer, but he just…..he was sick of being alone. He missed human contact. Even if it was all a lie and he was being taken somewhere to be killed…….at least he had a few minutes of physical contact with another human.

 

\--

 

When they’d arrived at the group’s apartment building, Felix had taken Hyunjin straight to Sanghyuk. After explaining the situation, Sanghyuk had asked for details about Hyunjin’s power. The leader had offered Hyunjin a bed, a place to stay for as long as he wanted, and he’d taken the offer. Just like when he’d taken Felix’s hand, he decided that he was sick of being alone and just went with it. He didn’t regret it, especially when Sanghyuk surprised him with something wonderful the next morning.

 “Open your eyes,” Sanghyuk instructed and Hyunjin did as told, “like them?”

“They’re nice,” Hyunjin nodded, smiling slightly.

He’d never had glasses like this. Well, they were more goggles then glasses, but the point remained; this was a first. As a child he’d had to do with whatever crappy pair of shades his mother dug up. After she’d died he’d only had one or two pairs and the other kids had been quick to break them, limiting his mobility to just his little room. When he was homeless, all he had was his cloth. Sometime he could find some sunglasses, but they never lasted very long.

But these goggles that Sanghyuk had gotten him……they were something else. He could see everything clearly and the band made sure that they wouldn’t fall off. This was good because if he didn’t have the band then they would have fallen off seconds later when Felix rushed to hug him from behind.

“You look good,” Felix complemented him, moving to stand in front of him and Hyunjin took in the other’s appearance for the first time. Felix was cute, adorable really. A bit shorter than him with freckles spread across his face. His smile was bright, like sunshine. Honestly, Felix was like sunshine.

“They shouldn’t break easily,” Sanghyuk said, “but you should still be careful.” That last part was directed more at Felix than Hyunjin and the younger pouted slightly.

“Come on,” Felix smiled, offering Hyunjin his hand, “let’s show everyone.”

“Ok,” Hyunjin smiled slightly, taking Felix’s hand. He had a funny feeling that this wouldn’t be the last time he took Felix’s hand and let the younger do as he pleased.

But that was fine, he liked the warmth of Felix’s hand in his.

 

\--

 

“You alright?” Woojin asked, startling the younger boy who was curled up in his lap.

“What are you talking about?” Hyunjin questioned, trying to pretend he hadn’t been sulking for the last ten minutes.

“You’ve been quiet and moody the last couple of days,” Woojin replied, “did something happen on your mission? Did you and Felix have a fight or something?”

“No,” Hyunjin sighed, “everything went fine on the mission, Felix and I worked together perfectly. Like we always do.”

He didn’t really like going on missions, preferring to stay home with his family, but since Sanghyuk always sent him out with Felix…….it wasn’t so bad. He liked spending time with Felix and it didn’t really matter what they spent their time doing. Hyunjin liked spending time with the others, like Chan who acted like his dad and Woojin who he felt the most relaxed around, but spending time with Felix was always special. Felix was his angel who’d saved him from his lonely existence after all.

“Then what’s the problem?” Woojin frowned, pulling the younger from his thoughts.

Hyunjin considered not telling the healer about what he was feeling, but in the end he just had to spill his guts. This was Woojin after all. He told his friend everything.

“Jisung and Felix are really close,” Hyunjin said.

“They’re best friends,” the older boy nodded, laughing slightly, “They were born less than twenty four hours apart, so I guess they were made for each other in a way.”

“They act like they’re dating,” Hyunjin sulked, snuggling into Woojin even more.

He didn’t used to get so bothered by how close Jisung and Felix were. He swears he used to be much more ok with it. But then…….then he started having feelings for Felix that went beyond friendship. He wanted to hold Felix’s hand and lace their fingers together. He wanted to kiss Felix and be kissed back. He wanted to wake up with Felix sleeping next to him every day for the rest of his life. He wanted to be the one who made Felix laugh the most, made him feel the happiest. He wanted to be the one who made Felix feel special and loved and wanted.

He wanted…….he wanted Felix; mind, body, and soul.

But he was scared.

Felix was so important to him and he didn’t want to ruin everything by sharing his feelings. He knew Felix wouldn’t end their friendship, he was too kind for that, but if Hyunjin confessed and Felix didn’t return his affections…….well, it would be impossible to go back to how things were. Hyunjin didn’t want to lose what he had, he couldn’t lose what he had. So keeping his mouth shut, even if all he wanted to do was scream his love from the rooftops, was his only option.

Besides, Felix deserved someone better.

Someone who could look at him without any help.

“Ah,” Woojin hummed, “I think I see the problem now.”

“Please don’t tell him,” Hyunjin begged, “please, I don’t want anything to change.”

“Alright,” Woojin agreed after a long moment.

Woojin might have promised not to tell Felix, but he didn’t promise not to tell anyone.

You see, Woojin knew that Felix returned Hyunjin’s feelings, he just wasn’t sure if Hyunjin actually liked him or what. Felix……well, he had some pretty nasty self-esteem issues. It came from a whole life of being told he was evil and from his power limiting his ability to connect with people. When he’d joined the family, it had taken him a few months before he truly believed that they all loved him as a brother. That anyone other than Chan could love him like a brother. Believing that anyone could love him like Hyunjin did…….

So, Woojin had to help. For the sakes of two of the most important people in his life, he couldn’t just sit around and watch them hurt thinking that their love wasn’t returned.

 

\--

 

“Why are they doing this?” Felix wondered, playing with the sleeve of his shirt.

“Because they’re dumb,” Hyunjin replied.

They pair had been locked in a closet, one so small that Felix couldn’t just take off his gloves and destroy the door without risking Hyunjin’s safety.  Felix didn’t have a clue as to why this was happening, but Hyunjin had a suspicion. He glared darkly at the door, planning out Woojin’s death in his mind. He was never going to tell the other boy anything ever again.

“Are you alright?” Felix asked after several minutes of silence, “you’ve been acting off the past few days, so…..I was worried that something happened.”

“I’m alright,” Hyunjin was quick to assure his friend, feeling horrible that he’d made sweet Felix worry, “I just felt a little sick is all.”

“Woojin fixed you up, right?” Felix pressed, struggling to move his arms so that he could check Hyunjin’s forehead. He didn’t know why he even tried; it wasn’t like he’d be able to feel much with his gloves.

“Yeah,” Hyunjin smiled slightly, “I’m good now.”

“Good,” Felix smiled in return before moving to rest his head against Hyunjin’s shoulder and wrapping his arms around the other’s waist. If they were going to be there for a while, he might as well enjoy it. Hyunjin decided to enjoy it as well, wrapping his arms around Felix. He felt himself relaxing with Felix’s warmth pressed up against him, his breath against his skin, and his scent invading his nose. He allowed himself to relax so much that his mind started to wander, to daydream.

It wasn’t long before his mind was pulling up one of his favorite daydreams, one involving himself and Felix.

It also wasn’t long before Hyunjin couldn’t hide his feelings. When Felix looked up at him, looking so incredibly adorable with that confused expression on his face, he couldn’t help but give in to the urge to kiss him. When Felix kissed back, it was like a dam broke. Everything Hyunjin had been feeling for months poured out of him in the form of messy kisses and wandering hands. Felix met every kiss with one of his own, every brush of Hyunjin’s hands were echoed by Felix’s.

“I love you,” Hyunjin panted against Felix’s throat.

“You love me?” Felix asked, pulling away slightly so he could look Hyunjin in the eye, “really?”

“Yes,” Hyunjin nodded, “you deserve so much, Lix. So much better than me, but I just…….I need to tell you.”

“Why?” Felix asked after a moment, “Why would you love me? I….I can’t even touch people without gloves. I believe people too easily. I’m too dangerous. I—.“

“Don’t talk about yourself like that!” Hyunjin snapped, hating Felix’s words more than he could describe, “You’re wonderful! You’re perfect! I love seeing your smile because it always makes me feel better. I love hearing your deep voice because it’s so calming.  I love how you believe in people, even when they’re too blind to see why you would. Even when they’re too stupid to see how wonderful you are. I love how you try to help people even when they’d rather turn you in for the reward money. I love you so much and I hate that you can’t see everything I see. You’re so amazing, I can’t even—.”

Felix cut him off with a kiss.

“I….I love you, too,” Felix said when he pulled away, “you…..you’re so perfect. You’ve got so much passion, so much love in your heart. You always know when someone’s having a bad day and you never hesitate to comfort them, to try to make them feel better. I feel so special when you pick me to cuddle with. It’s the best feeling in the world to know you feel that comfortable around me. That you trust me enough to fall asleep on my shoulder. I know you hate your eyes, but I think they’re wonderful. There’s so much emotion and love in them that it takes my breath away. There’s so many things I love about you, too many to count.”

Hyunjin was crying by the end of Felix’s speech and so was Felix. The pair hugged, whispered confessions filling the space around them. That was how the other’s found them and Hyunjin couldn’t be bothered to be angry at them for interfering, at Woojin for telling people his secret. He just led Felix to his room where they spent the rest of the night cuddling and pledging to love each other forever.

In the morning, they told the others that they were dating and everyone congratulated them. Hyunjin felt so warm, so happy and accepted and loved, that he started to cry a little. Felix cried, too. As he watched Chan try to stop the tears, he silently thanked Felix once again for offering his hand that day. Because of his angel, he had everything he always wanted; a home, a family, and love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so when it came to Hyunjin’s power, I just knew it had to be something related to looks somehow. It also had to be something that would have an effect on our little cuddle monster’s ability to be, well, his cuddle loving self (seriously, that kid is always attached to someone, it’s the sweetest thing ever). Since I’d already given Felix a ‘death touch’ power, I knew it couldn’t be that. And that’s when the idea for Medusa struck. It seemed perfect! Thus I went with it. Now, Felix and Hyunjin getting together……that was just something that happened. Like, I was writing and…….that’s what I wrote.


	10. Hakyeon

Hakyeon’s family wasn’t really middle class, but they weren’t poor either. They sat in this middle ground area where they almost always had what they needed and sometimes got what they wanted. It was a nice life and Hakyeon got to enjoy it for most of his life. And then the year he turned sixteen happened and everything went wrong. It felt like overnight everything changed, everything went to hell.

First, his father died. Some accident at work that the company was able to cover up. Then his mother got sick and they couldn’t ever seem to get enough money to help her. It wasn’t very long before she died as well and Hakyeon was left to look after his younger siblings. He promised his parents he would do it, that he could protect them until they were old enough to leave home and start families of their own.

He just hadn’t realized it would be so hard.

Hakyeon dropped out of school, taking any job that would take him. He was always so tired, so ready to just drop dead, but he couldn’t do that. Not until his younger brother and sister had grown up and gone to college and married. He had to keep going, it didn’t matter how horribly sick or tired he felt. His brother and sister knew this, it was why they never asked for things. At some point, they took on an after school job or two to help out.

One of those jobs is what led to The Problem.

 

\--

 

Hakyeon leaned against a wall, trying to catch his breath. Silently, he prayed that the hero chasing after him wasn’t too close behind him. He just…..he just needed a minute. Heck, just a few seconds would do. He needed just enough time for him to collect himself a little before he started running again. He wished……he wished for a miracle, for the hero to stop or for someone who would help him.

But that……

“Hey,” a man called out from the other end of the alley, “are you alright?”

 

\--

 

“Son of a bitch,” Chan cursed, shaking his head as Hakyeon took a sip of the drink Woojin had got him.

“I really wish you would stop having hope about heroes,” Taekwoon sighed sadly, “you just keep getting your heart broken again and again.”

“I know,” Chan replied, “but still……..I want to believe that not every hero out there is a bastard.”

“Do you know where your brother and sister are?” Sanghyuk asked Hakyeon.

“They should still be with those monsters,” Hakyeon replied, “I mean, I did the drop, so maybe they let them go, but……”

“You don’t expect them to have held up their end of the deal,” Woojin interrupted, “they have a way to control you now, to make you do the stuff they don’t want to do. Why would they give up that control when you can still be of use?”

“Exactly,” Hakyeon nodded, tears starting to form in his eyes, “I…..I failed them.”

“You didn’t fail them,” Sanghyuk was quick to insist, “You’ve done everything you could do. Now….now you just have to trust someone else to help do what you can’t.”

“Do you know where their base is?” Taekwoon asked, already moving to grab all the maps of the city the group had.

“I’ve got a general idea,” Hakyeon replied, “nothing to find their exact location. They…..they didn’t want to risk me selling them out.”

“Then tell us what you do know,” Taekwoon replied, smiling slightly at the other man, “and we’ll take it from there.”

“Ok,” Hakyeon nodded before looking around at the four other men, “but…..why? Why are you doing this? Aren’t you guys…..villains?”

“And aren’t the heroes, well, heroes?” Sanghyuk shrugged, “none of us really fit our title, do we?”

“Sanghyuk wants to make a better world,” Chan smiled, “fix the hero system, cleanse the corruption, and change how the world views powers. Helping people that the heroes have failed or straight up turned on…..that’s kind of part of our mission statement, too.”

Hakyeon nodded, digesting the information silently, before he pointed to a section on one of the maps.

 

\--

 

“I didn’t have to heal much,” Woojin reported, “just some minor wounds. Honestly, everything seemed to be just for show. I don’t even think some of the blood was theirs.”

“That would make sense,” Sanghyuk replied, “the worse they look, the easier it would be to control Hakyeon.”

Hakyeon only half listened to the pair talking, much more focused on watching his siblings sleeping. They looked so peaceful, so happy. He hadn’t seen them looking like that in months. Maybe even years. Heck, he hadn’t seen them at all in a few weeks. But now here they were, cuddled up in bed and sleeping. They were alive and safe and he honestly didn’t think that this would be something he would see ever again.

“Thank you,” he said, voice soft as the exhaustion finally started to kick in, “thank you so much.”

“It was our pleasure,” Woojin smiled.

“How can I pay you back for this?” Hakyeon asked, finally turning to look at the pair, “You saved my family, you saved me. How……what can I do to thank you?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Sanghyuk assured him, “just sleep.”

Hakyeon was too tired to argue, so he let Sanghyuk lead him to the bed where he curled up with his siblings. The next day, he figured out how to thank the people who’d helped him and saved his siblings.

He decided to join them.

He didn’t kill, often staying home with Woojin and Jeongin, but that was alright. Hakyeon also joined Woojin and Wonsik in working at the bar, allowing him to save up money for his siblings while not wearing himself out by working multiple jobs. Staying in the group’s home helped lessen him load too since he no longer had to pay for rent and the cost of food was shared between the whole group.

Hakyeon had asked for a miracle.

He got that and more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hakyeon’s siblings aren’t gonna join the group. He wants them to live happy, peaceful lives away from the violence that the group experiences. The others all agree and flat out refuse to let Hakyeon’s siblings do anything villain related. At first it kind of pissed them off ‘cuz they wanted to help, this is their family too, but eventually they came to understand and agree the other’s reasoning. Seeing Jisung and Felix coming home full of holes might have had something to do with it.


	11. Hongbin and Minho

Hongbin was a nineteen year old hero-in-training at a mid-level hero school. Hero schools weren’t mandatory, plenty of heroes never went to any of the schools. After all, all you needed was a license and a management company to be a hero. So long as you had a cool enough power and/or passed your licensing exam with a high enough mark, a company would happily take you. Hongbin wished that he could have done things that way, but passing the exam was hard without a personal trainer to help you so hero school it was.

Way back before he was born, hero school used to be open for teenagers. They functioned like a normal high school, save for the hero-based classes. But then some villains realized the opportunity that hero high schools presented. They were a chance to destroy a generation of new heroes before they could become strong enough to fight back. The heroes put a stop to the attacks, but not before countless young lives were lost.

After that, the public demanded that the age limit be put on hero school attendance. An age restriction was also placed on taking the licensing exam. Before, anyone could take it at any time, but with the public outcry the government had no choice but to place some kind of age limit on the exam. The age limits for both school and the exam were set at nineteen, but there was always talk about bumping them up by a few years. The hero school responded to this by making their entrance fees higher and higher each year, making it harder and harder for wanna-be heroes to get in.

Hongbin never thought much of any of this, always felt that it was necessary. That was what everyone told him anyway. The age limit was to protect kids. The rising entrance fees were to discourage the kids who didn’t really wanna be heroes, the kids looking for fame and fortune. It was all very necessary, all for the betterment of heroes and society.

It wasn’t until he started attending a hero school that Hongbin started to doubt everything he had been told.

 

\--

 

“I’m beat,” Chan yawned, holding open the door so that everyone else could enter, “who’s on dinner duty tonight?”

“Woojin’s supposed to be,” Hyunjin replied, voice muffled because his face was pressed against Felix’s neck, “but since he’s under the weather……..I don’t know.”

“I can try,” Jeongin offered.

“I’ll help,” Wonsik smiled, ruffling the youngest hair playfully, “it’s easier when it’s two people anyway.”

“Hold up!” Sanghyuk suddenly said, grabbing Jisung and Hakyeon and pushing them behind him, “someone’s here.”

“I’ll go see if Woojin’s ok,” Taekwoon said before rushing off to do exactly that, Felix and Hyunjin hot on his heels.

“Whoa!” the stranger said, flicking on a light to reveal two people standing in the living room, “we aren’t here to fight, we want to talk.”

“You just show up in our home and expect us to believe that?” Sanghyuk hissed, flames already starting to lick their way up his arms.

“Please,” the one clearly doing all the talking said, moving to stand in front of the other, “just hear us out. Then you can do whatever you want.”

“Sanghyuk,” Hakyeon whispered, “maybe we should listen. The one who hasn’t said anything looks young.”

“Alright,” Sanghyuk nodded, “then talk.”

“Right,” the man said, “My name is Lee Hongbin and this is Minho, my little brother. I’m a technopath and he can turn invisible.  I spent the last couple of months trying to find you and that lead me to your bar a couple of days ago. I checked the nearby security camera and saw all of you and then I tracked you here. Minho watched the building to see when you would all be out.”

“We wanted to show you that we were useful,” Minho finally spoke up, “well, hyung did anyway.”

“Why?” Sanghyuk pressed, “Why did you want to find us? Why did you want to show how useful you can be? What do you want to gain from all of this?”

“I started reading your fan sites way back when you first started getting attention,” Hongbin explained, “I didn’t want to believe at first, but after a while…..there was too much proof. But I still believed that there were good heroes out there, that I could be a hero and fix things. But then……then I joined a hero school.”

“You’re a hero-in-training?” Jisung asked, backing away slightly like everyone else.

“I hate it,” Hongbin said, voice rising in anger with every word, “everyone there……I thought that I’d find real heroes, but everyone in my class is so arrogant and selfish. All they care about is fame and money! No one cares about actually being a hero! And the rest of the school isn’t much better. I can’t even talk about being a real hero because everyone will laugh at me, call me delusional and an idiot. They already looked down on me because they think my power is weak, but it got so much worse when they found out I believe in real hero values.”

“Not surprised the schools are like that,” Chan huffed, “they probably rigged the system to weed out the real heroes.”

“Most real heroes don’t go to hero schools,” Wonsik nodded, “but they get fewer and fewer each year.”

“It will get even less soon,” Hakyeon frowned, “they’re trying to bring in a fee for taking the exam. Students would get a free pass the first time they take the exam with a discount if they fail. At least the ones from top schools would.”

“Defiantly trying to weed out the real heroes,” Jisung nodded.

“So,” Sanghyuk turned back to the Lee brothers, “you joined a hero school thinking you could be a real hero and got overwhelmed with how many fakes-in-training there are. Doesn’t explain how you ended up coming to us. I mean, you do know we’re villains, right?”

“You aren’t villains, though,” Hongbin said, “not really. Not like the other people who hold that title.”

“You want to make the world better,” Minho nodded.

“We want to help,” Hongbin said, “hence the demonstration of our skills. And my attendance at a hero school can give you access to information you never would have been able to get before.”

“You could be useful,” Sanghyuk hummed in agreement.

“Hyuk,” Chan frowned, “can we actually trust them?”

“Look,” Hongbin sighed after glancing over his shoulder at his brother, “I’m gonna lay the rest of my cards on the table here. I’m not just here to help bring the corrupt system down, I’m also here for Minho. He gets so much crap for his power. I mean, it’s nothing like what some of your people have gotten, but……” Hongbin paused, taking several deep breaths to calm himself, “they all think his power is weak, that he’s weak. All our lives, everyone has always shit on him and his dreams. Our own parents talk shit about him and call him useless.”

“We’re going to destroy that way of thinking,” Sanghyuk summarized, “and you want to be there helping.”

“For my brother’s sake,” Hongbin nodded, “you can understand that better than anyone, right?”

The pair stood there for a long moment just looking at each other before Sanghyuk offered Hongbin a hand.

 

\--

 

“Here,” Hongbin smiled slightly as he dropped a bunch of papers on Sanghyuk’s desk, “notes on every graduating hero-in-training.”

“Good,” Sanghyuk smiled slightly, handing Chan some of the papers, “you were careful?”

“Of course,” Hongbin scoffed lightly, “no one has any idea I did anything.”

“Good,” Sanghyuk nodded, lightly ruffling the younger man’s hair, “very good.”

“How many do you think are real?” Chan, ever the hopeful one, asked.

“Might be one or two in the bunch,” Hongbin shrugged, “honestly, from what I’ve overheard I don’t think there’s anyone worth saving.”

“Shame,” Sanghyuk frowned, “but we’ll only pay them a visit if we have proof, so.....”

“We might not see half of these people,” Chan hummed.

“How was Minho today?” Hongbin asked, taking a seat beside his friends.

“He’s getting more and more talkative every day,” Chan grinned, “he and Jisung spent the day fooling around.”

“It’s nice that Minho’s so close to him,” Sanghyuk smiled softly, “Jisung’s been a little lonely since Felix and Hyunjin started dating. I mean, he’s happy for them, wouldn’t ever wish them ill, but…..”

“They spend a lot of time together,” Chan nodded in understanding, “and when Jisung used to spend so much time with Felix……well, it leaves him pretty lonely. Sure, he spends time with us, but…..”

“Felix is his best friend,” Sanghyuk finished, “his brother and platonic soulmate. None of us can really, truly fill that void. Even me and I’m his big brother.”

“But Minho seems to be close?” Hongbin asked.

“I wouldn’t say that,” Sanghyuk said, “Minho and Felix.....they make him happy in different ways.” Sanghyuk paused, “I….don’t really know what I’m saying. I mean, you’ve only been here a couple of months. It’s probably way too soon to be thinking what I’m thinking.”

“Felix fell for Hyunjin within a couple of months,” Chan pointed out, “and I’m pretty sure Hyunjin fell for him in even less. A couple months is a lot of time for what you’re thinking to be happening.”

“You know your brother,” Hongbin nodded, “if you’re thinking what I think you’re thinking……”

“I’ll wait for Jisung to say something to me before I start thinking anything,” Sanghyuk laughed before turning to Chan, “and I refuse to meddle like you and Woojin did.”

“We didn’t really have a choice,” Chan said, pretending to be offended, “those two love-struck fools would have never said anything if we left them alone.”

“True,” Sanghyuk agreed.

“If Minho is feeling anything,” Hongbin frowned, “I’m not sure if he’ll say anything. He might even withdraw from Jisung.”

“Cross that bridge when we get there,” Sanghyuk advised, “but if that does end up happening……hopefully Jisung will confront him about it before we feel the need to step in.”

“We’re talking about our brothers love lives,” Chan suddenly frowned, “and yet….we’re all kind of single.”

“Well, me and Bin are,” Sanghyuk smirked slightly, “if you could just admit that you’re attracted to Woojin……..”

“Hey!” Chan huffed, “I admit to it, I just haven’t done anything.”

“Careful how loud you say that,” Hongbin teased, “Hyunjin’s looking to return the favor you two did for him and Lix.”

“He’d probably find an even smaller closet,” Sanghyuk grinned.

“Crap,” Chan sunk down in his chair, shoulder sagging, “he would, wouldn’t he?”

Hyunjin did end up finding out about Chan feelings and Woojin’s feelings as well. He did end up locking the pair in a closet with Felix’s help. They did end up walking out a couple leading to many jokes within the group about the magic of closets. About a week later, Jisung asked Minho out making them the group’s third couple.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually like this chapter’s world building a lot. Like, I love how this chapter shows just how deep the corruption of the hero system goes, that the heroes trusted to teach the next gen are actively trying to weed out good heroes so that the system doesn’t change. I know that, like, Hongbin and Minho’s powers probably don’t seem weak at first glance, but……..  
> It’s like Kirishima in My Hero. His power is awesome, perfect for hero work, and yet there he is in chapter……13 calling it boring. In his mind, it’s not big and flashy like Katsuki or Deku’s powers and thus isn’t as good. That’s kind of the mindset on powers in general in this AU: the flashy powers are seen as ‘the power of a true hero’ and the not so flashy ones are seen as less-than. …..and, ya know, heaven forbid you get a ‘villain’ power ‘cuz then you’re fucked.  
> Ya know, reading this over……..the attacks on the teen students……..makes you wonder if it was really villain. Or maybe the corruption had already begun. Or maybe I’m just saying that to mess with you all hahaha  
> Oh, and yes. Yes I did just make the Woojin/Chan and Jisung/Minho couples a thing.


	12. Seungmin

Seungmin didn’t always hate his father. There was a time, right before his power manifested, where he loved his dad. And then his power came in and everything went downhill. Well, that’s how it seemed in his memories. One minute he was less than three and loved his dad, next he was…….four maybe……and he hated him. He didn’t remember what exactly happened to cause the change, but he also didn’t care. His father was a monster, what did it matter how he came to realize that?

His mother tried to talk him out of his hate, but her words fell on deaf ears. Honestly, it just made him angrier. How could his mother defend her abuser like that? How badly had that monster twisted her mind for her to do that? More importantly, was the damage too much to be fixed? Would his mother always be sympathetic to his father? Always defend his actions?

He never really got an answer.

His mother found out about his father cheating on her. The woman was a hero herself; younger with a stronger power, rich family, and good placement on the charts. The poor woman finally snapped and took her own life. Seungmin would always remember coming home from school to find his father laughing with some of his hero buddies, totally unconcerned with his missing wife. When the cops showed up at their door to report that his mother had jumped from a highway overpass, his father acted every bit the distraught husband. The news ate it up and his father’s popularity went up a bunch.

But once the cameras were gone and Seungmin was alone with the man, the care vanished. In place of tears were curses because how dare that woman do something so selfish. Who could look after Seungmin now? His father would have to waste money on a nanny or something. It wasn’t like he could get his girlfriend to do it, she was too well-known of a hero. People would notice her taking care of someone’s kid and ask questions.

It made Seungmin sick.

With his mother gone, the beatings also got worse. After all, he was now the only target for his father’s rage. To make it worse, no one seemed to think twice about the bruises his father couldn’t cover. Everyone saw the black eyes or the sprained wrists or whatever the monster had done and assumed his father was just starting his hero training. Seungmin was thirteen after all, that was the age most hero kids started training. The odd black eye was normal.

It wasn’t normal.

Seungmin’s hate grew.

 

\--

 

“This should be it,” Seungmin said, pulling his hood farther over his head. It would do him no good to be recognized, especially so close to his goal.

Seungmin had been watching the Twin Flames since they killed their first hero. He hadn’t thought too much of them at first, they weren’t the first villains to go after heroes, but as time passed he started to notice something about them. They said they wanted to change the system, that they would never kill the innocent and……..damn if they didn’t stick to that. As their crimes grew, as they gained more allies, it was harder and harder to ignore them. To brush them off as just another villain team.

It had been three, almost four, years since the Twin Flames had first appeared. Seungmin had spent the last year trying to track them down without anyone noticing, a task easier said than done when you were the child of number twelve. There was always someone around, someone waiting with a camera looking for a hot scoop. But he’d finally managed to do it! He’d tracked down the Twin Flames to a small bar on the poor side of the city. Now all he needed to do was go in and ask for their help.

Hopefully they’d listen to him.

He walked into the bar to find the group of ‘villains’ already dealing with the appearance of another who wanted to join them.

 

\--

 

“I don’t think I can heal a lot of these,” Woojin frowned as he looked Seungmin over, “the scars are just……they’re so old.”

“He’s been beating me since I was little,” Seungmin replied, tone bitter and filled with hate. Felix and Jeongin were quick to rush to the young man’s side so they could hug him.

“Can’t believe no one saw what he’d been doing,” Hongbin huffed from his laptop, “I mean, there’s dozens of blogs dedicated to following you around. There’s hundreds of pictures showing you bruised and bandaged. How has no one put two and two together yet?”

“The power of the media,” Chan sighed, “pose with enough babies and puppies and people will start to think that’s reality.”

“And this loser poses for a lot of good causes,” Jisung added, handing Hongbin his phone, “I mean, look at all of it! If I was part of the ignorant masses, I’d buy it, too.”

“This is everything you could find on his schedule for the next two weeks?” Sanghyuk clarified, not glancing up from the papers on his desk.

“Yeah,” Seungmin nodded, “well, I didn’t take anything regarding dinner and lunch dates with his new bimbo. Those are on his phone so I could only get a glance or two at them.”

“This is more than enough,” Taekwoon assured him, “Lix? In? Can you guys show him to a room?”

“Sure,” Felix grinned, “do you mind sharing? Or would you rather have a place to yourself?”

“I don’t mind either way,” Seungmin replied.

“You can share with me!” Jeongin grinned, “Hyunjin and I used to share an apartment, but he’s moved into Lix’s room.”

“Sorry,” Hyunjin winced, trailing behind the three. He knew how much Jeongin hated being alone. Even though the youngest liked to act all grown up and strong and unhindered by his past, he still got scared like anyone else. He still had nightmares like everyone else in their family.

“It’s alright,” Jeongin laughed, “you just wanna spend time with your boyfriend. I don’t mind.”

“You’re more forgiving then Chan,” Jisung laughed as he and Minho joined the group, “he kept complaining about noise.”

“It’s why he moved out,” Minho giggled.

“Like he’s got any room to talk,” Hyunjin playfully rolled his eyes.

“Hey!” Chan yelled, trying to hold back his laughter, “that’s slander, young man!”

The others all laughed and Seungmin…….he felt…….warm.

Was this……a family?

Was this what he’d wanted all his life?

 

\--

 

“What do ya know?” Taekwoon huffed a small laugh, “the news is right for once.”

The group was gathered around the TV in Sanghyuk’s apartment, watching the evening news. The reporters were talking about Seungmin’s father. The day before, all they could talk about was the tragedy of his recent murder. But now the police had turned up some rather…….interesting information about him. It wasn’t anything about how abusive he was, just how he’d been getting a few different crime organizations to bump off some higher ranked heroes. Apparently he hadn’t done much to cover his tracks, leaving the files just lying around his house.

But now the cat was out of the bag.

Now people wouldn’t see him as this perfect angel, an example of what a hero should be.

“I’m checking blogs,” Hongbin reported, “there’s a bunch of people going over his career, picking everything apart with a fine toothed comb. I don’t think this is the last we’ve heard about this guy’s dirty little secrets.”

“No,” Taekwoon nodded, “I think we’re going to talking about this for months to come.”

“Won’t be enough to change the system, though,” Chan frowned, “the other fakes are probably just gonna start covering their tracks better.”

“We might get some more support though,” Felix smiled, “no better proof that we’re right than something like this.”

“True,” Chan nodded after a moment, “very true. This guy is probably the best advertisement we could get for our cause.”

“Are you alright?” Jeongin whispered to Seungmin, “I mean, this is still your dad. Killing him……it can’t be easy.”

“I’m……ok with it,” Seungmin replied, “Is it…..weird that I really don’t feel anything? Like, I was right there when Hyunjin turned him to stone and I just……..I didn’t feel anything.”

“It’s normal,” Sanghyuk finally spoke up, “with what you’ve been through, I think that feeling nothing is normal.” He looked at Seungmin for a long moment before continuing, “Now for the more important question, what do you want to do now?”

“Do now?” Seungmin blinked, “I…..don’t know. I never really thought about it. I’ve been so focused on seeing him dead, what comes next……..I never thought about it.”

He’d honestly never thought that he could actually kill his father. He’d always imagined that he’d spend his whole life as that man’s punching bag until he snapped like his mother had. Now that his father was dead, now that he was free…….he had no idea what he wanted. Well, that wasn’t totally true. He kind of wanted to stay with Sanghyuk and Jeongin and Felix and Hyunjin and everyone else. He wanted to be a part of their family. He just…..wasn’t sure if he could ask them for that. He had come to them looking to use them for his personal revenge, did he have any right to ask them for anything after that?

“You’re more than welcome to stay here until you figure it out,” Sanghyuk offered, “I’m sure Jeongin wouldn’t mind sharing his space for…..however long you want to stay.”

“I wouldn’t!” Jeongin grinned brightly, “I like having a roommate!”

“Alright,” Seungmin nodded after a moment, “but only until I know what I’m gonna do now.”

Seungmin never left.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so I was originally gonna have Seungmin and Changbin share a chapter since they joined within hours of each other. But then I started to write it and it just……it didn’t work. What I wanted to do with them…..they needed their own chapters! Also, poor Seungmin. I feel really bad about this, but…….it needed to be done. From go, I wanted one of the group to be the abused child of a pro hero and Seungmin……he ended up being the one I picked.


	13. Changbin

Changbin joined the group a few hours before Seungmin did. He showed up at the bar, asking Woojin for the Twin Flames. Hyunjin glanced up from the homework he and Felix were doing together, taking in the slightly haggard appearance of the new arrival, before returning his attention to his work. Sanghyuk and Taekwoon had worked hard finding a tutor for the members of their group who hadn’t been able to finish high school, he wasn’t going to waste their hard work by getting distracted.

Besides, people coming into the bar looking for the Twin Flames wasn’t exactly out of the ordinary. Most of the time, it didn’t lead to anything. Woojin or Wonsik or Hakyeon or whoever was on duty would talk to them a little bit, gage what kind of person they were, and then send them on their way. Sometimes they got a new family member and that was great, but that wasn’t very common.

“Maybe we should go?” Felix wondered, voice low so as to not be overheard.

“Why?” Hyunjin questioned, glancing at the stranger, “does he make you uncomfortable?”

“No,” Felix frowned, “not really. I just…….his shadow is moving.”

Hyunjin looked and, sure enough, the man’s shadow was twitching. He looked around, trying to find a light source that would explain it, but there was nothing. Slowly so as to not attract attention, Hyunjin pushed Felix farther into the booth while trying to signal Woojin about what they had noticed. He didn’t know what this guy’s power was, but he wouldn’t be the first person to react badly to news that the Twin Flames weren’t around.

There was one guy who could shoot spikes who’d taken the rejection extremely badly.

“Why are you looking for them?” Woojin asked, noticing Hyunjin’s signal and nodded slightly.

“I don’t wanna talk about it,” the stranger said, playing with the sleeve of his shirt. That was when everyone noticed the scars peeking out from the fabric.

Woojin’s eyes softened, looking over the boy and noticing more scars peeking out from between the collar of his shirt and his scarf. Felix let out a small whine, his heart going out to the young man. Hyunjin winced as well, feeling some of his own scars itching. He suddenly didn’t want to know what the other man had gone through to get such marks.

“Sanghyuk,” Woojin called, “can you come out here?”

Sanghyuk was half-way through questioning Changbin when Seungmin walked in.

 

\--

 

Hyunjin scowled as he watched Changbin and Felix messing around. He didn’t like to think he was a jealous boyfriend, but this……this sure seemed to point towards exactly that.  He just…..he couldn’t help but feel jealous every time he saw Changbin with Felix. There was just something about the way the newest member of the group looked at Felix that just…….it pissed Hyunjin off!

“Babe?” Felix asked, sitting down beside the other man, “Did something happen? You look angry.”

“I don’t like how he looks at you,” Hyunjin admitted, knowing that lying to Felix wasn’t the right move, “he looks at you……it’s the same way I look at you.”

“Really?” Felix blinked in confusion, “are you sure you aren’t imagining it? Changbin…..he’s just a friend.”

“I’m sure,” Hyunjin frowned, “and I know that’s how you see him, but…….but I really don’t think that’s how he sees you.”

“Maybe you just need to spend time with him?” Felix suggested, “He’s really nice. Like, he tries to act all dark, but he’s really cute.”

“Maybe,” Hyunjin sighed.

That night as Hyunjin lay cuddled in bed with Felix, his mind started to wander back to the topic of Changbin. He started to wonder if the other really did look at Felix with love or if it was his mind playing tricks on him. It wasn’t exactly a secret to anyone that he thought he didn’t deserve Felix, that he thought his bright angel could do so much better than him. Was this just an extension of that? Or did Changbin really have feelings for Felix?

“Babe?” Felix yawned, rolling over to find Hyunjin still very awake, “what’s wrong? Jinnie, talk to me. Please?”

“I’m not sure if he does like you,” Hyunjin sighed, “or if I’m just…..projecting or something.”

“I love you,” Felix smiled slightly, pressing a soft kiss to his boyfriend’s lips, “I love you so much and I always will. There’s nothing that could make me stop loving you. I just wish you could see what I see.”

“I wish you could see what I see, too,” Hyunjin replied, brushing some of Felix’s hair from his face, “Jisung told me about what you said last week. About how good I looked with that girl from the coffee shop.”

“We’re kind of a mess, aren’t we?” Felix laughed slightly.

“Yeah,” Hyunjin nodded, “but you’re my mess and I’m yours. So long as we remember that…….we’ll be fine.”

“I like it when you’re positive,” Felix grinned, “now, go to sleep? We’ve got work to do in the morning.”

“It’s Seungmin’s first mission, right?” Hyunjin asked, “Think he’ll be ok?”

“If he isn’t,” Felix frowned at the thought of their friend getting into trouble the following day, “then at least he’ll have us, Jisung, and Minho.”

“Jeongin might be joining us,” Hyunjin frowned, “I heard him talking to Sanghyuk about going with us.”

“Sanghyuk might let him come,” Felix replied after thinking it over, “it’s not that dangerous a mission, so he’d be fine.”

“We’ll see what Sanghyuk decided in the morning.”

Honestly, they were both kind of hoping that Sanghyuk would say no. The idea of Jeongin taking part in missions just……it made them worry. He was their baby after all, didn’t matter how powerful he was or how many times he insisted he was grown up. No one wanted him to be on the front lines, no one wanted to see him have to…..have to kill.

 

\--

 

“Hi,” Hyunjin said, taking a seat beside Changbin on the couch of Sanghyuk’s apartment.

They always called it Sanghyuk’s apartment, and it technically was, but it was really more of a communal space. The group always ate together in the apartment’s kitchen/dining room. They always went to Sanghyuk’s living room when they wanted to watch a movie together. When Hyunjin had first arrived, it had been this apartment where he’d spent his first night.

“Hey,” Changbin said, looking up from whatever it was he was writing, “something wrong?”

“Nah,” Hyunjin replied, “just wanted to hang out a little bit.”

“You never hang out with me,” Changbin pointed out, “you’re always with Felix. And if you aren’t with him, you’re with Woojin, Seungmin, and Jeongin. Sometimes you, Minho, and Felix will go to the dance studio a few blocks over for a few hours to blow off some steam.”

“Oh,” Hyunjin frowned slightly, realizing that this would probably be the first time he hung out with Changbin. He felt pretty bad about that.

“So why?” Changbin asked.

“Felix thinks I should actually talk to you,” Hyunjin replied, “and thinking about it now, I agree.”

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” Changbin said after a moment, “I’m alright being alone.”

“If that was true,” Hyunjin challenged, “then you wouldn’t hang out with Chan, Jisung, and Felix half as much as you do.”

“Maybe I just don’t think we’d get along,” Changbin fired back.

“What makes you say that?” Hyunjin replied, eyes narrowing slightly.

“I’m just playing around,” Changbin suddenly laughed, “Felix said you were a little jealous, so I thought I’d mess with you a little.”

“I’m dumb,” Hyunjin sighed, “I know.”

“It’s good that you know that,” Changbin nodded sagely, “you should know…….I do love him, but only as a brother.”

“Ah,” Hyunjin winced, feeling even more foolish. Thinking about it now, the way Changbin looked at Felix was pretty similar to how Chan looked at the younger Aussie.

“He…..reminds me of someone,” Changbin said, playing with the fabric covering his arms subconsciously. Hyunjin winced even harder knowing that he’d brought up painful  memories for the other.

“I’m sorry,” Hyunjin apologized, “for making you think about it.”

“It’s fine,” Changbin forced a smile, “you didn’t mean to. You didn’t know.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Hyunjin frowned, “we’re family and family shouldn’t treat you like I’ve been treating you.”

“I’ve only been here a few months,” Changbin shrugged, “and it’s not like I go out of my way to spend time with anyone. Heck, Felix, Chan, and Jisung all came to me. They insisted on making friends, not me.”

“I didn’t open up to everyone right away either,” Hyunjin said after a moment, “just Felix.”

“Chan mentioned something about that,” Changbin hummed, “he figured it was because of your power.”

“Everyone here,” Hyunjin smiled slightly at the memory of when he’d first arrived, “well, everyone who was here at the time, they were the first people after my mother to accept me. To love me. It was easy to bond with Chan and Felix, they were like me. And Felix is the one who brought me home. Everyone else…….it took me a while to realize that they really did want me.” He glanced at Changbin, “everyone loves you, too. Doesn’t matter what’s in your past, this is your home. We’re your family.”

The pair fell silent, just looking at each other until Sanghyuk made his way into the room.

“Hyunjin,” the leader smiled, “Minho and Felix were looking for you. Changbin, Woojin and Taekwoon wanted some help with dinner so I volunteered you. That alright?”

“That’s fine,” Changbin nodded, getting up and going to find the two older men.

“Where are they?” Hyunjin asked as he got up as well, “did they mention what they needed?”

“They’re in Minho and Jisung’s apartment,” Sanghyuk replied, taking a seat on the now empty couch, “no idea what they wanted though.”

“I’ll go see,” Hyunjin said, “I promise we’ll be here in time for dinner.”

“Hyunjin,” Sanghyuk called before the younger man could go very far.

“Yeah?” Hyunjin turned, looking at Sanghyuk in confusion.

“Keep it up,” Sanghyuk replied, nodding towards the kitchen.

Hyunjin nodded before leaving.

“How’d it go?” Felix asked later that night when the couple was curled up on their own couch watching a movie.

“We didn’t talk that much,” Hyunjin replied, “so I didn’t really see that cute thing you were talking about.”

“But you’ll try again?” Felix pressed, “please, Changbin needs more friends.”

“I’ll try again in a few days,” Hyunjin promised.

A few months later, Changbin could often be found messing around with Felix and Hyunjin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m sure you’re all wondering what Changbin’s past is. I’m also sure you’ve got some theories based on the hints I left. But…..I’m not gonna tell you. It’s more fun to have you imagine what happened to our sweet baby Changbin.


	14. Jaehwan

“Jaehwan,” the young hero’s boss frowned, “I have a mission for you.”

“I’ll complete it to the best of my abilities,” Jaehwan smiled, bowing deeply.

“You’re going to be infiltrating the Twin Flames and their allies,” his boss, and mother, told him, “you’re going to gain their trust no matter the cost. And when they’ve come to believe you’re one of them, we’ll capture them all in one fell swoop.”

“Yes, ma’ma,” Jaehwan nodded, keeping his concerns silent.

He was a well-known hero, how on earth was he going to gain the trust of notorious hero killers like the Twin Flames? And what was that ‘no matter the cost’ stuff about? Was….was his boss asking him to help kill people? How could he call himself a hero if he’d helped to kill people? Jaehwan liked that he was a hero, a good and real one. If he did this……could he still think of himself as that? He couldn’t turn down this job, though.

Jaehwan hid his concern under a smiling mask, one he found himself using often when he was in his office.

Or around his mother in general.

When he was finally allowed to leave, he was quick to flee to the roof of the building. Looking out over the city he protected normally calmed him, but this time he just couldn’t silence his thoughts. He knew that the Twin Flames and their allies needed to be stopped. He heard about their crimes every day on the news. Every hero he met couldn’t shut up about them, about their fear of them. He’d lost count of how many of his fans had expressed their concerns for his safety. Those always hurt the most because he couldn’t do anything to assure them that he was alright.

Not without telling them the whole truth anyway.

Yes, Jaehwan was very aware of the problems within the hero system. He was very aware that the Twin Flames had only ever killed heroes who’d done wrong. He did, after all, work with these people. He was, after all, part of the broken system. There were few people in the world who knew the problems with the hero system better than he did.

But all of those problems did not justify what the Twin Flames and their allies were doing.

Murder was never justified in Jaehwan’s eyes. He was sure that there had to be a better way. Take the former hero who had died a few months prior for example. All that the Twin Flames and their allies needed to do was reveal the ex-hero’s dirty deeds. Killing him was defiantly not necessary. In fact, it almost made him into a victim in the eyes of the people.

Jaehwan bit his lip, wondering how on earth he was going to manage to pull this off.

 

\--

 

It took several months and a stroke of luck before Jaehwan managed to make contact with a member of the villain group. Just in time too, his boss was starting to get really mad at him. The members he managed to contact were called Stone and Ash. He’d read a lot about them, every file he could get his hands on. Stone’s real name was Hwang Hyunjin. His mother hid him for most of his youth and then he’d been place in foster care after her death. He eventually attacked another kid, killing him, before fleeing to the streets.

He didn’t know when he hooked up with the Twin Flames, but it was assumed that Ash had something to do with it. The pair was always together and there had been a theory floating around that if you captured one, the other would be willing to sell out the others to ensure the return of their partner. Someone had made an attempt to test that theory and all it did was get them killed. Apparently, Ash didn’t take too kindly to having his partner stolen away.

Ash……well, he was a hero killer through and through. He and Siren had been young teens when they’d popped up on the radar for killing a hero. After that, the pair started to travel the world, a string of hero deaths following them wherever they went. Jaehwan’s heart hurt for the pair. Reading their file, he’d found dozens of interviews with teachers and classmates. Everyone claimed that it was just a matter of time before the pair went evil, that they were destined to be villains. Jaehwan had heard stories about how people with ‘evil’ powers could be treated and……..yeah, it was only a matter of time before those people snapped and became exactly what their tormentors wanted them to be.

Jaehwan couldn’t help but morn for the good people the pair could have been.

Trying to talk the pair into a meeting wasn’t easy. The whole time Stone just stood there, glaring darkly at Jaehwan. Ash seemed a little more open to the idea of a meeting and Jaehwan found it rather easy to talk to him. They walked away with a location and time for a second meeting set up. Now, if anyone on the Twin Flames’ side would actually show was another story. Ash made it clear that the Twins could decide not to go and all Jaehwan could do was hope that they would.

 

\--

 

“It’s a trap,” Chan said, “no way it isn’t.”

“Do they think we’re stupid?” Taekwoon huffed.

“Must if they’re doing this,” Hongbin scoffed, “you’re not going.”

“Goes without saying that they aren’t,” Minho spoke up, cuddling his boyfriend tighter.

“Actually,” Sanghyuk said, instantly earing cries of disagreement from everyone else.

“Sanghyuk,” Woojin frowned, “no. Just…..no.”

“It’s stupid!” Taekwoon snapped, “You’re stupid!”

“I…..actually agree with Hyukkie,” Jisung frowned slightly, “I kind of want to see what this guy says.”

“Exactly,” Sanghyuk nodded, “he’s a good hero, a real one. I can’t help but be curious.”

“You’re insane,” Hakyeon scowled, moving to chop his leader’s neck, “totally bat shit.”

“I….think I understand,” Seungmin sighed, “he’s like me, someone who grew up inside the system. And now he’s part of the system. If you can get him to talk openly……..that could give us some interesting information.”

“That’s what I was thinking,” Sanghyuk nodded, “and if he or his boss or whoever came up with this plan is serious about it........well, we could get some useful information out of it.”

“But we’d have to give them information in return,” Wonsik pointed out, “what exactly would we tell them? Lies? Well, they could sell us lies, too.”

“I know,” Sanghyuk nodded, “I know.” He sighed heavily, “Look, we’ll put it to a vote. If the majority doesn’t want to do this, we’ll skip the meeting and never talk about this again. If the vote goes in favor of doing this, then anyone who doesn’t can skip this job.”

“Do you really want to do this?” Jeongin asked.

“I’m curious enough to give it a try,” Sanghyuk nodded, “but this isn’t about what I want. This will affect everyone, so everyone’s opinion should be heard.”

Everyone shared a look. They knew Sanghyuk would never risk their lives, he cared about their family too much. If he wanted to do this…….

The vote was unanimous in favor of meeting the hero.

 

\--

 

“Thank you for meeting with me,” Jaehwan bowed, trying to hide how nervous he felt as the Twin Flames made their way over to him.

“No problem,” the older Flame replied, “I’m curious why a well-respected hero such as yourself would want to talk to villains like us.”

“Trying to move up in the ranks?” the younger asked, clearly trying to antagonize a reaction out of Jaehwan.

“No,” Jaehwan said, “I….I believe in your cause.”

“Our cause?” the elder asked, eyebrow raised, “and what is our cause.”

“You want to put an end to fake heroes,” Jaehwan replied, “and change how people treat others based on their power. As someone within the hero system, someone who sees fake heroes every day, this……I support you.”

“If you see what the fakes do,” the elder pressed, “why are you only coming to us now? Why are you coming to us at all? You have the power to stop these fakes from continuing to ruin the title of hero.”

“You’re defiantly underestimating my power and position,” Jaehwan sighed sadly, “if I even thought of doing something about it, my mo--.” He cut himself off before he could reveal too much. Jaehwan couldn’t lie, couldn’t keep the truth from his words to save his own skin. That was why he’d worked so hard to master fake smiles.

The Twin Flames shared a look, more than a little curious about what the hero had almost said, but dropped the subject.

“You realize,” the elder asked, “that we can’t just……trust you. You need to prove yourself to us, little hero.”

“We’re going to give you a little task,” the younger said.

“I know,” Jaehwan nodded, feeling bile rising in his throat. He had a horrible idea where this was going, but he had to do it. His mother…….she wouldn’t forgive him if he failed here.

No matter the cost.

 

\--

 

“What have I done?” Jaehwan sobbed as he watched the news reporting on a death of a hero, “oh god, what have I done?”

He didn’t know the hero well, defiantly not well enough to know that she was a fake. But when the Twin Flames said she was their target……she had to be. They’d never killed in innocent before. He’d asked what she’d done, just to be sure, and they’d handed over a file. He’d been shocked by the horrible things she’d been up to. He’d thought he knew just how horrible the hero system was. He thought he knew the limits of what was being done.

Apparently not.

 and at first that made it easy to gather the information that the Twin’s needed.

But then, after he’d finished the drop, he’d been alone with his thoughts and……and he realized that he’d just helped kill someone.

He might as well have set her on fire himself.

“I’m so sorry,” Jaehwan cried, “I’m so sorry.”

 

\--

 

“I have a question,” Jaehwan asked.

“Shoot,” the elder Twin replied.

They’d been meeting like this for three months now. In that time, Jaehwan had helped kill four heroes. In return, he’d been able to save five. Although, a part of him wondered if he’d really saved them or if the Twins had just let him foil their plans. For one, he’d leaked the documents proving what a fake the hero was. This had been the first time the Twin Flames had let him take the files with him, until then they’d always had a policy or reading them on sight. Something about that…….Jaehwan wasn’t sure if that hadn’t been their plan all along.

“Why don’t you give this information to the news?” Jaehwan asked, “or leak it online? You could out these people as bad heroes without killing them.”

“Do you really think that’s possible?” the older Twin asked, “you should know how the heroes have control of the news. And online.......unless you have a following, no one will see what you’ve posted.”

“And now you have a following,” Jaehwan frowned, “but only those followers will believe you.”

“Exactly.”

“Look,” the younger spoke up, “we aren’t crazy about killing. If there was another way, we’d have done it. This was our only option when we started. It got the results we needed, so we kept at it.”

“I understand,” Jaehwan nodded.

And maybe he did understand just a little bit.

The Twin Flames wanted him to understand a little more.

 

\--

 

“You sure you want to bring him into the fold?” Hongbin asked.

“I’m sure,” Sanghyuk nodded, “I want to at least try.”

“A power like his will be useful in the future,” Chan added, “especially with what we’ve got planned.”

“We’ve got to play this carefully,” Jisung frowned, “one wrong move and he’ll go running back to his boss spilling everything he knows.”

“Which isn’t much,” Minho pointed out, “the real loss would be the information flow he’s provided us.”

“We should introduce him to Seungmin and Jeongin,” Changbin said, “they’re the poster children for why heroes suck.”

“Jeongin is a cute little kid,” Taekwoon nodded in agreement, “the idea that heroes abandoned him to…..what happened……that alone should grow the doubt in his mind.”

“He’s probably got a good idea of what Seungmin grew up with,” Chan said, “so seeing him with us, happy and healthy………”

“Bring the proof,” Hongbin added, “let him take a copy to read later. Make sure that there’s time for everything to really sink in before your next meeting.”

After dinner that night, Sanghyuk brought up this plan with the others.

“Would you both be alright with that?” Sanghyuk asked the pair in question, “coming along and sharing your stories?”

“I’m fine with it,” Seungmin shrugged, “whatever helps us achieve our goals.”

“I’m alright with telling him everything,” Jeongin said, slightly hesitant.

“Don’t say you’re alright with it if you aren’t, Innie,” Sanghyuk said, ruffling the youngest member’s hair, “both of you, don’t do this for the group. Do it because it’s what you want. We won’t achieve our goals by hurting ourselves.”

“It’s like Chan said,” Seungmin insisted, “he probably already knows what I’ve had to deal with. All I have to do is show up and tell him how much better life is with everyone here. I can defiantly say good stuff about my family.”

“Can I sleep on it?” Jeongin asked, “I……”

“You can sleep on it,” Sanghyuk assured the other, “don’t worry, Innie.”

“Speaking of sleep,” Hyunjin said with a yawn, “it’s late and Felix and I have work to do tomorrow.”

“We should all get some sleep,” Woojin nodded in agreement.

“Goodnight, everyone.”

 

\--

 

“You’re running late, hero,” the elder Flame laughed as Jaehwan rushed into the room.

“I’m sorry,” Jaehwan panted, “I….something came up.”

“It’s fine,” the villain said, “I was just teasing you a little. I think we’ve known each other long enough for me to do that.”

“Teasing me?” Jaehwan blinked.

He…..he’d never had anyone in his life who did that. Well, no one who’s teasing was all in good fun. Who’s teasing had no ill will hidden within. Jaehwan was the first to admit that his life was rather……lonely. Growing up, the focus had always been on training. His mother saw his potential to be a great hero and had pushing him to achieve it. This didn’t leave him very much room for friends, especially after she decided to homeschool him because the other kids at school were too much of a distraction.

After he’d debuted as the flying hero Wings, he’d still been rather lonely. No one at his company would talk to him unless necessary, the interactions as short as possible. His fans only cared about getting autographs or pictures when meeting him. The other heroes…….well, he tried to avoid them. At first he’d tried to make friends, but when he’d found out how they really were, he’d started trying to distance himself. That hadn’t sat too well with some and soon he found himself ostracized and made fun of at every opportunity.

But the older Twin Flame…….

“Yeah,” the villain nodded, “that’s what……sort-of friends do? I think? Honestly I’m not sure.”

“Hyuk,” a third person said, drawing Jaehwan’s eye to the two people standing beside the older Tw—Hyuk.

“Right,” Hyuk laughed, “Wings, I’d like you to meet two members of my family.

“I’m I.N,” the younger of the pair said, “and this is Seungmin.”

“Seungmin?” Jaehwan asked, looking over the young man, “as in….”

“Kim Seungmin,” Seungmin nodded, “yeah.”

“You…..you’re a villain now?” Jaehwan frowned.

“I’m with my family now,” Seungmin corrected, “I’m sure you’ve seen the evidence the public collected of what my father did to me. Well……”

“Seungmin came to us looking for help,” Hyuk said stepping forewords, gently patting Seungmin’s shoulder when he noticed the troubled look on the other’s face, “he needed to get away from that man and he knew we were the only ones who would do something.”

“I’m part of this family now,” Seungmin said, looking Jaehwan straight in the eye, “I’m part of a family now. No one hurts me, they love me.”

Jaehwan looked the young man over carefully, trying to find….something…..anything that would indicate he was lying or being forced to say that. All he found was honesty. He’d suspected as much. He’d been meeting with the Twin Flames, with Hyuk, for a couple of months now and he seemed……he seemed really nice. Nothing at all like other villains Jaehwan had talked to. It made him wonder just what had made him, as well as other others in his group, turn to villainy.

“And I.N?” Jaehwan finally asked, “You must have brought him here for a reason, so……tell me.”

“I was,” I.N took a deep breath, “I was being used as a…..a lab rat. Before the others found me and saved me. I…..I don’t remember how I ended up there, all I remember is my cell and…..the experiments.” I.N started shaking, eyes going unfocused as he recalled those dark days before he’d been saved by his family.

“I.N,” Hyuk frowned, pulling the young boy into a hug, “it’s ok. Remember what I said? You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.”

“Here,” Seungmin grabbed a file off of a nearby crate and handed it to Jaehwan, “this is everything we collected on the people who took part in those…….experiments. And everything we know about the other victims.”

“I’ll contact you about another meeting later,” Hyuk said, still holding a trembling, sobbing I.N.

“Right,” Jaehwan nodded, tucking the file into his coat and turning to leave. As he left, he heard the start of a whispered conversation between the three.

“Silly kid,” Hyuk smiled sadly at his youngest brother, “I told you that it was alright if you didn’t do this. I know how much it hurts to talk about it.”

“I wanted to help,” I.N replied, voice thick with tears, “I’m sorry.”

“You have nothing to be sorry about,” Seungmin insisted, hugging the youngest from behind and creating an I.N sandwich.

Jaehwan glanced back, smiling softly at the sweet sight.

He wasn’t smiling later as he read through the file he’d been given.

 

\--

 

Jaehwan tried to hide his scowl as he made his way to his mother’s office the next day. Morning meetings had become the norm over the last couple of weeks, his mother demanding that he give her some kind of information on the Twin Flames and their allies. Apparently, five and a half months was plenty of time for him to find out something. Heck, she probably thought that the whole investigation should be finished and the villains in jail by now.

Sadly, things didn’t work like that and Jaehwan was honestly surprised by how much he’d already accomplished.

That wasn’t why he was upset though. His mother demanding results wasn’t anything new; he was more that used to her tight deadlines. What troubled him was the files he’d read last night. What he’d read……it was like some kind of Stephen King novel. It had kept him up all night, trying to understand how anyone could do something like this to anyone, let alone children. It…..it had to be fake. It just had to be.

But I.N’s face…….it was real. Hyuk had never given him false information before. Why would he give him lies now? There had been an address in the files and Jaehwan had decided that he was going to go there. Apparently, that was where Hyuk had taken the other children, the ones who weren’t like I.N. who hadn’t kept their sanity. The file said that some were better now, or at least better than they were when the villains found them, and Jaehwan wanted to talk to them.

He needed to talk to them.

He didn’t need to talk to his mother while all of this was rolling around through his head.

“Jaehwan,” his mother scowled, “tell me that you have something for me today.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Jaehwan nodded, “I do.”

“Good!” she smiled, or as much as her could smile, “tell me.”

Jaehwan had debated telling her about Seungmin on his commute to the office. It would be something to get her off his back for a few days and Hyuk wouldn’t have brought Seungmin along if he wasn’t prepared for everyone to know that the young man was with him now. But it…..it didn’t feel right. Giving her the name ‘Hyuk’ didn’t feel right either. So Jaehwan decided he’d give her something else.

“It was just the older Twin and two of his allies yesterday,” Jaehwan reported, praying that his voice didn’t give away his lie, “one of them slipped for a moment and started to call him by his real name.”

“What did he call him?”

“He didn’t get far,” Jaehwan bowed his head, trying to hide his face in case something in his expression gave him away, “it started with an H though.”

“It isn’t much,” his mother scowled, “in fact it’s almost nothing.”

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” Jaehwan said, his shame about lying to his mother easily mistaken for shame over not having anything useful.

“Is there anything else?” she asked, voice going cold and Jaehwan was……actually very surprised to find that he didn’t feel any worse. Normally he felt terrible after hearing her use that tone, so bad that he’d say anything to make her voice warm again. But this time……he didn’t mind.

“I might have a lead,” Jaehwan said, “a couple of years ago, the Twin Flames and their allies attacked an old warehouse. No one was reported dead. No one claimed ownership of the building. It seemed odd to me, so I looked into it. tired to connect it to anything else that happened around the same time.”

“And?”

“There might be something a couple towns over,” Jaehwan replied, “I won’t know if it’s connected or not until I go there and ask around. I would like to request a couple of days off to investigate, ma’am.” Jaehwan had to applaud himself for lying so well. Honestly he was terrified that she would see through him like glass.

“Granted,” his mother said after a moment, “you can have a day off this Saturday. But you better come back with something Jaehwan. The next time I see you, I want information.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Jaehwan didn’t voice his irritation over having to wait five days.

 

\--

 

Wings had clearly not expected to find anything that he found at the address he’d been given. He didn’t expect the place to look so nice when everything around it looked……..well, not as nice. He didn’t expect to find so many children there either, running around and happy. He defiantly didn’t expect to find Chan at the front gates waiting for him either.

“Hyuk figured you’d come,” Chan shrugged.

“So he sent you to…..what?” Wings frowned, “guide me? Chase me off?”

“Neither,” Chan replied, “he didn’t ask me to come here. Ash and Stone come here a couple times a month to see the kids and I decided to tag along.”

“Why do they come here?” Wings frowned, “and you came to….what? Keep me away from them?”

“More like ask you a couple of questions,” Chan replied, “like why there are no reports about Seungmin being a villain on the news yet. And why no one knows that Hyuk is called, well, Hyuk.”

Wings opened his mouth a couple of times before shutting it, clearly not knowing how to answer. He didn’t know why he’d done it either.

“I don’t know,” he finally said and Chan nodded. He had a feeling that the hero was questioning a lot of things now, after everything they’d told him, and felt it better to not push him when he was so unsure.

“Come on,” Chan said, turning to leave, “they should be finishing up now.”

“Finishing what?” Wings asked.

Chan didn’t answer, instead leading Jaehwan to a little graveyard behind the building. The graves all looked well-kept and there were flowers left at each one. Standing among the graves was Hyunjin keeping a careful eye on Felix who was kneeling at a grave. Wings looked around, trying to figure out what exactly was going on.

“These are the kids who didn’t survive,” Chan said, “when we raided that house of horrors, we took everyone, dead or alive. I.N stayed with us, the other living children came here, and we laid the dead children to rest here.” He sighed sadly, morning for the souls they hadn’t been able to save, “we couldn’t leave them there. They’d been abandoned enough in life. That’s why Lix comes here, so they aren’t forgotten and alone.”

“Oh,” Wings nodded. He counted twenty five graves and his heart ached at the knowledge that this was only the children that they’d found. There was probably dozens more kids who had no bodies to burry.

“Wings,” Felix said as he made his way over with Hyunjin, “you’re here?”

“I wanted to look around,” Wings said, “ask some questions.” He realized then that none of the villains were wearing masks or costumes or anything. Like him, they were dressed in plain cloths. Looking at them, you wouldn’t be able to tell that they were villains who’d killed dozens of heroes. Wings was a little surprised at how normal they looked, how soft and gentle they looked

“I don’t think you should ask the kids questions,” Hyunjin said, “You might trigger someone.”

“Right,” the hero nodded, thinking back to I.N’s attempt to share his past, “you’re right.”

“The files should have enough information,” Chan said, “and your questions……I think this should answer them.”

“It does,” Wings nodded, “I……I have a question for you three though.”

“Shoot,” Hyunjin shrugged.

“Why are you here?” Wings asked, “As in….why are you villains?”

“Don’t you know how people like us are treated?” Chan asked, tone harsh as he recalled the years of torment he and Felix had been subjected to because of their powers, “we never had a choice to be anything but villains.”

“Yeah,” Wings nodded, “I….I guess.”

“You read our files, right?” Chan frowned, “then I bet you think you’ve got a pretty good idea about how we ended up like this.”

“Ash killed a hero and the two of you ran after years of being told you were evil because of your powers,” Wings replied, “Stone killed another kid at his foster home and a couple of years later he turned up working with the Twin Flames.”

“That’s only part of the story,” Hyunjin snapped, not at all liking how his boyfriend flinched when the hero brought up his first kill, “that hero that Felix killed was trying to kill them! Chan asked the guy if they could be heroes and he tried to kill them in the name of rooting out evil before it could bloom! All Chan ever wanted was to be a hero and do good! All Felix ever wanted was a quiet, peaceful life free of hate! But society thinks people like them are evil, powers like theirs are evil, and never gave them the chance to do what they wanted.”

“Jinnie,” Felix frowned slightly, squeezing the other’s hand, “hey, it’s alright.”

“It isn’t!” Hyunjin replied, “the way he said it……he thinks you wanted to kill that fake.”

“I know,” Felix sighed sadly, “but….but it’s alright.”

“The hero…..wanted to kill you?” Wings asked, eyes wide in horror, “for……for your power? Because he thought it was evil?”

“Yeah,” Chan nodded, “he almost did, but Lix…….he saved us. But no one was going to believe us, so we ran. And we kept running until we heard about Hyuk and Sunggie. They took us in, gave us a family. They promised that they’d change the world so that people like us weren’t treated like future villains.”

“I believe it was self-defense,” Wings said after a long moment of silence, “and Stone……that was self-defense too, right?”

Hyunjin winced at the memory of his first kill, cuddling deeper into his boyfriend’s arms. He didn’t…….regret what he’d done. That kid he killed wasn’t going to stop hurting him until one of them was dead. but knowing that he’d killed someone…….that it could have been prevented if society was just a little less messed up……..

“Yeah,” Chan nodded, “the other kids decided he was a danger, so they started to beat him. Maybe they were hoping to kill him, maybe they just wanted to chase him away. But one day, Jinnie just…….he couldn’t take it anymore. He opened his eyes and…….” Chan sighed sadly, “it made them stop, it saved him for more beatings. You…….when Lix brought him home, we had a doctor friend look him over. Some of his bones……those brats broke them and the people who ran that hell hole never bothered to get him properly treated so the bones healed wrong. We had to break one of his arms a second time so that it could be healed right by our healer.” Wings visibly winced, unable to imagine the pain Hyunjin must have felt over having to re-brake a bone a couple years after the original break had happened.

Wings didn’t stick around much longer after that, he’d learned enough for one day. As he left, Chan advised him to tell his boss about Seungmin. The hero just nodded, not asking anything about the other’s knowing tone of voice.

“This isn’t how Sanghyuk wanted the meeting to go,” Felix frowned slightly, “do you think he’ll be mad?”

“I think this might have gone better than the original plan would have,” Chan replied.

“Do you really think we’re getting through to him?” Hyunjin asked, “He could be lying.”

“Hongbin’s been keeping an eye on him,” Chan replied, “hacked his home a couple of weeks ago. He’ll get an even better idea of what’s going on when he starts his internship next week.” Hongbin had gotten into the office’s systems within days of their first meeting with Jaehwan, but actually being inside the building and talking to people…….it should make for a much more complete picture.

“Feels too easy,” Hyunjin scowled, “way too easy.”

“It’s taken Sanghyuk and Jisung over four years to get to this point,” Felix pointed out, “I don’t think this is even slightly easy.”

 

\--

 

A month went by before Hyuk brought another new face and story to a meeting with Jaehwan.

Jaehwan had heard about Taekwoon’s father, the frozen hero Icicle. He’d looked up to the man when he was young, wanted to be a hero like him. And then he died and Jaehwan remembered morning like the rest of the world. He remembered his mother taking him to the funeral and seeing the hero’s wife and son. They had looked so sad, so broken, that it just……it burned itself into Jaehwan’s memory. Especially the wife. Jaehwan remembered seeing her expression grow more and more distraught with every person who talked to her, who gave her their condolences.

They told her that her husband died the death of a hero.

He had never seen someone that sad before.

Taekwoon was calm as he explained his father’s death, the cover up that had happened to protect the one responsible, but Jaehwan could see the anger hidden deep within the man. He found he couldn’t blame him for that rage simmering deep inside. Taekwoon had, after all, lost his father and then been forced to watch the one who’d killed him be praised for his heroic acts.

A few weeks later, Hyuk brought Ravi to their meeting.

The empath didn’t have the horrible background of the others and maybe…..maybe that made it worse. He’d had a normal life until his home was destroyed. It angered Jaehwan to know that the hero responsible had refused to help because it would be too costly and would earn him no attention. It was such a selfish though, so unheroic. How couldn’t Jaehwan feel angry about it? Ravi seemed so nice; he didn’t deserve what had happened. It made Jaehwan grateful that Hyuk had found him and given him a home.

N had tagged along on a meeting and easily offered up his story. Jaehwan had scowled as the other had relayed his tale, his anger over the other’s treatment growing with every passing word. N had needed the help of a hero, but everyone he found had ignored him. They hadn’t wanted to listen to him; they wanted a quick bust so they could get another job. One that would be more…….press enticing. Jaehwan didn’t want to think about what would have happened to N’s siblings had the Twin Flames not gotten involved.

Fixer was the final member of the family that he met.

That meeting…….it was very different from the others. Fixer had come alone, something that had alarmed Jaehwan at first. He knew that Fixer was very behind-the-scenes, so if he was making an appearance…….did that mean that something had happened to Hyuk? Or the others? Fixer had assured him that everything was fine, that he just wanted to talk to him. So they did. And it was an enlightening conversation to say the least.

“So,” Jaehwan frowned, “you…..you really don’t have a reason to have joined them?”

“I have a reason,” Fixer replied, “it just……it doesn’t involve heroes hurting me or killing someone I care about or ruining my life somehow. I just……” he smiled softly as he recalled the first time he met Hyuk and the others, “Sunggie needed help. He would have died without it. So I helped. And after he was safe, Hyuk and I talked. I’d already been reading one of the fansites, already looked into things a little. I wanted to join them right then and there, but Hyuk said to think about it more.”

“And you did?”

“I did,” Fixer nodded, laughing slightly, “All it did was reaffirm my convictions. My dad didn’t agree at first, but……thing have happened since then. My mom……she’s a doctor. She…..she’s seen some stuff. She’s supported me since the day I left.”

“And you don’t kill?”

“Hyuk goes out of his way to keep it that way,” Fixer replied, “me, I.N, N, and Ravi haven’t killed anyone. Though with how determined I.N is to help us achieve our goals, I don’t know how long before he’s forced to take a life.”

“Oh,” Jaehwan blinked. He……he’d never thought that Hyuk would do something like that.

“He tried to keep Sunggie from killing anyone for a long time, too,” Fixer added, “Hyuk……he doesn’t want the rest of us to be painted in red like him.”

Jaehwan was silent for a long time before finally asking something that had been bugging him since he started this job. Since he first heard about the Twin Flames. He’d started to ask Hyuk this question a couple of times before, but the other deflected every time.

“Why?”

“Huh?”

“Why is Hyuk doing this?” Jaehwan asked, “What…..what opened his eyes to the truth of the hero system?”

“Number one killed his mother,” Fixer told him after a long moment of silence.

 

\--

 

Jaehwan laughed at the joke Sunggie had told. Since learning about Hyuk and Sunggie’s mother…….no, ever since his talk with Siren, Ash, and Stone, he had become more open with the villains. Their meetings stopped being about business and started being about the people in the meeting. They started actually talking, learning about each other. They made jokes and laughed and smiled. It made Jaehwan happy, happier then he’d ever been because for once he had friends. And he knew that it was probably stupid for a hero to call a bunch of villains friends, but…..

Those villains made him happy.

In the nine or so months that he’d known them, they’d made him feel more…….human then he’d ever felt before. The people at his company treated him like he was a thing, even his own mother. To them, he was a tool that they could use however they saw fit. It was pure luck that until recently, what they wanted lined up with what he wanted. Well, sort of. He wanted to be a hero, his management and mother……well, he suspected that they wanted the fame and money that come with being a top hero.

But now……Jaehwan wasn’t so sure if he wanted to be a hero anymore.

He liked Hyuk and his family, liked how they made him feel. And……and maybe he wanted to feel that feeling a lot more than he wanted the lonely, empty life of a hero. Maybe he………maybe he also wanted to be around Hyuk. He really liked how the other made him feel. He liked the warm smiles that the other gave him. He liked hearing Hyuk talk about his dream of a better world. He liked how caring Hyuk was when it came to his family and to him. He liked--.

“Your phone,” Ash frowned, interrupting Jaehwan’s train of thought.

“Oh,” Jaehwan frowned, looking down at the caller id to see his mother’s name, “I…..oh.”

“Another meeting?” Hyuk asked, scowling at the device, “didn’t you already have one this morning?”

“I did,” Jaehwan nodded, “maybe……maybe I’m needed somewhere?” Not likely. If he was needed for an emergency, it wouldn’t be his mother calling him.

“You should answer it,” Sunggie suggested.

“Right,” Jaehwan nodded sadly, “I’ll……I’ll call you on the burner to set up another meeting?”

“Yeah,” Hyuk nodded, smiling softly at him, “take care, be safe.”

Jaehwan smiled back before leaving.

He wished that he hadn’t left.

The meeting with his mother was……it was bad. She yelled at him, even smacked him at one point as she demanded results. Jaehwan forced himself not to cower under the force of her rage. He had never, ever, seen her that angry before and the part of him that still wanted his mother’s love…….that part was going crazy.

“Get it together, Jaehwan!” she finally snapped before kicking him out of the room, “you’re a hero, not a villain, act like it.”

Jaehwan stood in front of her door for a moment, her final words ringing in his ears. He knew she was right, he had to stop playing around. He had to pick a side. He had to decide if he wanted to be a hero, or if he wanted to be a villain.

The choice was easy.

Jaehwan went to his apartment and packed a bag. Once his bag was packed, he stopped and looked around. His bag was pretty small as he’d only decided to take the things he needed or really wanted and….that wasn’t much. Most of his apartment was decorated in things that weren’t his, things picked out by the interior designer that his mother had hired. The personal touches he’d made were few, small little things that he mostly added in order to pretend that his life wasn’t as empty as he knew it was. Looking at it, he wondered how he’d managed to fool himself into believing that for so long.

He left then, already calling Hyuk and requesting a meeting.

 

\--

 

“I’m sorry for trying to deceive you all,” Jaehwan said, bowing deeply, “I hope that you can all forgive me, but I understand if you never do.”

“You know that we knew from day one that is was a trap, right?” Taekwoon frowned slightly, “you never fooled us for a second.”

“If it bothered us,” Chan nodded, “then Sanghyuk wouldn’t have introduced you to everyone. He wouldn’t have brought you home.”

“Why would you think we’d never forgive you?” Felix asked, “We’re friends.”

“We’re family,” Hyunjin added, “at least we are now.”

“Come on,” Jisung grinned, grabbing Jaehwan’s arm and dragging him off, “I’ll show you around.”

“I’m coming, too,” Jeongin cried, rushing after them.

Sanghyuk smiled at the sight, his heart feeling so full over finally having his whole family under one roof.

“You look happy,” Hongbin said, smiling happily over how calm his friend and leader looked.

“I am,” Sanghyuk nodded, “our family…..it feels complete.”

“Well,” Minho laughed, “until the next stray stumbles through the door.”

“True,” Sanghyuk laughed, “very true.”

“Hey,” Hongbin said, “I….I don’t think I ever thanked you for taking us in.”

“And you don’t have to,” Sanghyuk replied.

“But we want to,” Minho said, “you…you saved us, Sanghyuk. You gave us so much. A home, love and support, and a family. You……thank you for…..for everything.”

The three fell silent for a moment before Sanghyuk pulled the brothers into a hug. It quickly became a group hug when the others in the room noticed.

 

\--

 

“So,” Sanghyuk said, sitting down beside Jaehwan on the balcony of the ex-hero’s new apartment, “how does it feel to be a villain?”

“Don’t know,” Jaehwan replied, “I’m…..not really sure it’s totally sunk in yet.” He sighed, “Not looking forewords to the news reports about this.”

“You get used to it,” Sanghyuk assured him, “at some point, their lies start to become white noise.”

“If you say so,” Jaehwan said, stretching out his wings.

“They really are beautiful,” Sanghyuk said, looking at the white feathers.

“Thanks,” Jaehwan blushed. It wasn’t the first time Sanghyuk had said that about his wings, but it still made him feel all warm and giggly inside. “Your fire is beautiful, too.”

“My mother said that, too,” Sanghyuk sighed, looking up at the night sky above them, “she was so proud of my flames.”

“I think she’s proud of you for using them to help make the world a better place,” Jaehwan said.

“I like to think that,” Sanghyuk smiled softly, “but…….sometimes I wonder. Not as often as I did when I started down this path, but…….with how things are going……”

“You’re finally going to make a big move,” Jaehwan frowned slightly, “no more picking off the small fries. You’re going for the big dogs.”

“The biggest dog of all,” Sanghyuk nodded, “number one.”

“The one who killed your mother,” Jaehwan hummed.

“I’m not sure if I should,” Sanghyuk admitted, “it just…….it feels less about the big picture and more……personal. I……”

“It’s alright,” Jaehwan said, “you’ve gotten revenge for Seungmin and Taekwoon. You’re going to make the fakes who are responsible for hurting Jeongin pay. It’s alright if this time things are a little personal for you and Jisung. No one would think badly about you for it.”

“I know they wouldn’t,” Sanghyuk said, “I just……..I don’t know.” He laughed slightly, “I really don’t know. Maybe I’m just……I’m worried. I don’t want my family to get hurt and moving forewords with our plans…..”

“We’ll be fine,” Jaehwan assured him, grabbing Sanghyuk’s face to make him look at him, “We’re going to be alright. With you leading us, we’re going to be alright.”

“That’s a lot of faith you have in me,” Sanghyuk said, “and you’ve only officially been part of the family for a few hours.”

“I know a good person when I see them,” Jaehwan shrugged, “and you’re a good person. I know you’ll get us all through what’s coming alive. All you should be worried about is what you’re going to do when all your dreams have been achieved.” He paused, “what are you going to do?”

“I was thinking about fading away,” Sanghyuk replied, “becoming just a chapter in the history books. But I’d do it is such a way that people would fear my return should heroes and society return to the way it was.”

“So you’re just gonna hide away somewhere and live out your life?”

“Yeah.”

“I….,” Jaehwan bit his lip feeling nervous, “I could live like that.”

“Could you?” Sanghyuk asked, smiling slightly.

“Only if you wanted someone to come with you!” Jaehwan insisted, panicking slightly, “ah! Not that I was saying I’d come with you. Just, um, just that living like that sounded nice!”

“If you wanted,” Sanghyuk laughed, “you could come along.”

“Really?”

“Really,” Sanghyuk said, taking hold of Jaehwan’s hand.

The pair sat there together for a while, just watching the night sky. Eventually Sanghyuk got up to leave, pressing a quick kiss to Jaehwan’s lips before heading to his own apartment. Jaehwan almost fell off the balcony in shock. He went to bed soon after, smiling so hard it hurt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is by far the longest chapter. Don’t know why I’m surprised by that, makes sense since there’s so much to cover here.


	15. Blue Fire

The group sat on the roof of their apartment building, waiting for a sign that the mission had been a success. Everyone was anxious, no one liked that Sanghyuk and Jisung had gone alone to face Number One. When the Han brothers had told them of this plan, everyone had fought them on it. It was already a dangerous mission, why did they want to make it harder on themselves by going in alone? Eventually they’d managed to talk everyone into it and now everyone regretted agreeing.

 “Sunggie promised,” Felix suddenly said, holding onto Hyunjin’s hand tightly, “he promised they would be fine.”

“Sanghyuk promised as well,” Taekwoon agreed, “he’s never broken a promise before.”

“But,” Seungmin bit his lip, “shouldn’t…..shouldn’t there be a sign by now? If things worked out…..”

“Everything will be fine!” Felix snapped before freezing, eyes widening as he realized what he’d done, “oh no, Minnie! I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to--!”

“It’s alright, Lix,” Seungmin smiled slightly, “I know. I’d snap too.”

“Hey!” Minho suddenly yelled, “I see fire!”

Everyone rushed to the edge of the roof, looking out towards Number One’s office. His office was massive, a tower that stood high about everything else in the city and could be seen clearly even from the poorest part of the metropolis. He’d always claimed that it was to remind villains that he was always there, always watching. Those who knew what an arrogant bastard he was knew that really is was an ego thing.

And now that building was being lit up by flames.

Blue flames.

Everyone would see it, exactly what Sanghyuk wanted.

“So pretty!” Jeongin cheered, throwing his arms around Seungmin and making the other dance around with him.

“The heroes are gonna be in a fit after that,” Jaehwan said.

“Without their leader, they’ll be like headless chickens,” Taekwoon nodded.

“The power struggle should be interesting,” Chan spoke up, “who’ll take the title, number two? Or that new rookie Hongbin was telling us about? The kid considered to be the closest to becoming the new number one.”

“I hope it’s the kid,” Felix said, “He’s an actual hero.”

“They’ll probably follow number two, though” Seungmin frowned, “if he’s in power, nothing changes. Bad heroes can keep their jobs and don’t have to pay for their crimes. The kid would try to change things.”

“But they know that we’re hunting the fakes,” Hyunjin pointed out, “and if we’ve taken down the biggest fake of all…….they might be convinced to change. If only to save their own skins.”

“Let’s worry about that later,” Sanghyuk said as he and Jisung joined the others, “let’s focus on our victory now.”

“Yeah,” Jisung grinned, taking a seat between Minho and Felix, “tonight is for celebration. The corrupt king is dead!” the others cheered and all attention turned to doing as told; celebrating their win.

“You alright?” Jaehwan whispered, resting against Sanghyuk. This was, after all, the hero that killed his mother.

“I feel good,” Sanghyuk replied, “we’ve taken the biggest step towards achieving our dream of a better world.”

“Now we just focus on bringing down everything else,” Jaehwan smiled, pressing a kiss to Sanghyuk’s cheek.

“I hope the world likes blue fire,” Sanghyuk laughed, “because they’ll be seeing a lot more of it.”

“How’d you get here so fast?” Jaehwan questioned, pulling away so he could look Sanghyuk over for injuries, “and how did the fight go?”

“We had a teleporter buddy on standby,” Sanghyuk replied, “kid calls himself Kai. And the fight…..I’ll have to ask Woojin to heal us up tomorrow.”

“How bad?” Jaehwan scowled, not at all liking Sanghyuk and Jisung putting off getting healed.

“Just minor stuff,” Sanghyuk assured him, “nothing that can’t sit until morning. That bastard was getting slow in his old age, probably should have retired but……too late.”

“If you say so,” Jaehwan huffed, not totally believing Sanghyuk since the other had a nasty habit of downplaying his own injuries, “but Woojin heals you both first thing in the morning, got it?”

“Got it,” Sanghyuk laughed, “now, can we go watch the building burn? I want to enjoy this victory while it’s still fresh.”

“To the first victory of many,” Jaehwan grinned, taking Sanghyuk’s hand and leading him over to everyone else.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, from here on out, things will turn to more extra canon content-type stuff. I mean, I’ll probably write a little something along the line “XX years later”, but I feel like that’s more……final chapter type stuff. The kind of thing you write when the story is done and you don’t wanna revisit the AU. But I wanna play around in this AU a bit more. Thus: extra canon content! I will be taking a couple days off before I start posting that stuff though on account of starting to come down with something. Tis the season and all that. But I’ll be back when I’m feeling better, so look forewords to new stuff then!


	16. Dance

“Sanghyuk?” Felix asked, startling the elder villain.

“Yeah?” Sanghyuk replied, “What’s up, Lix?”

“I was wondering,” Felix replied, words slow as he tried to remember the correct Korean, “is there a place here to…….to dance?”

“Dance?” Sanghyuk frowned slightly, clearly confused as to why Felix would need something like that.

“I just,” Felix sighed, defiantly feeling the language barrier, “I like dance. Blow off steam. Make me happy. Mom taught me.” It wasn’t exactly what he wanted to say, but he hoped that his tone of voice could say what he couldn’t.

“Oh,” Sanghyuk smiled slightly, understanding perfectly what Felix was trying to say, “I think I can find something like that for you, Lix.”

A few days later, Sanghyuk showed Felix to a little dance studio not far from their current residence. Sanghyuk couldn’t help but smile as he watched Felix dancing, laughing and looking more happy then he’d ever seen the younger. He made a mental note to make sure that there was always a place where Felix could go to dance before joining the younger in dancing along to some female pop group’s newest hit song.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got the idea and just had to write it ‘cuz it sounded so cute in my head.

**Author's Note:**

> So, I wanted to say that powers developed around 1-2 years old, but I couldn’t get it to fit in. so, um, yeah, powers start to develop around 1-2 years. There are some physical signs at birth though. For example: Sanghyuk has blue fire and when he was born he was a bit warmer than the average baby. Like, not fever levels of warm, just enough to be noticed. Someone who’s power leaves them with, say, a tail…..they’d probably have a longer tail bone at birth. Someone who’s power is flight or who has horns would be born with, like, nubs in the areas that the wings or horns sprout from.


End file.
